Intelligence And Anxiety: A Love-hate Relationship

Typical is the image of the bright student, with an impeccable curriculum, who despite his intellectual gifts and his outstanding capacity for academic success, is consumed in a sea of ​​nerves every time an exam approaches. Intelligence and anxiety, in this and other examples, seem to go hand in hand.

This hypothetical relationship between a high intellectual level and anxiety has been studied and examined, both for its evident empiricism and for its theoretical-practical implications, on many occasions and from various disciplines.

A study from Lakehead University in Canada has established strong support for this link between high intelligence – bright, creative and analytical minds – and anxious tendencies – fear of the social, anticipations and excessive nervousness and worry, among others.

Caution, however, must guide the assimilation of possible causal relationships of this type: it is not true that any person with a high creative potential or with a high IQ has some kind of psychological disorder or problem behind him.

However, what can be affirmed is that there is with some frequency the stereotype of the person whose behaviors and internal states sometimes seem to be out of sync with the capabilities of a more than privileged mind.

The science behind the relationship between intelligence and anxiety

There is a popular saying that ignorance can bring happiness. Turning this saying around, we obtain that the opposite of stupidity – wisdom – can become synonymous with unhappiness. Anxiety, for its part, has enough power to inflict that unhappiness on people.

The fact that people with high IQ tend to present, with greater probability, episodes of anxiety and even chronic and generalized anxiety has prompted relevant lines of research aimed at elucidating why an intelligent person, so frequently, can experience frustration, unhappiness and arrive to make inappropriate decisions for their well-being.

While in the academic field you can see outstanding students who show a more than desirable tranquility and balance, on more than one occasion you can also see students who despite their intellectual gifts:

• They tend to anticipate events negatively.
• They quickly get frustrated with unexpected changes.
• They show stress traits with an abnormally high frequency and intensity.
• They present a considerable decrease in their academic performance.

Thus, the above behaviors can hamper academic and professional success, and probably personal success.

White matter: implications for intelligence and anxiety

The brain white matter is responsible for the transmission of bioelectric information between neurons ; not so much so in the brain’s processing of information, which is attributed to the gray matter.

With the aim of delving into the study of this relationship between intelligence and anxiety, the scientists responsible for the aforementioned study used neuroimaging techniques – and, specifically, magnetic resonance imaging or MRI – in order to reveal underlying causes.

The findings were as surprising as, almost to the same extent, logical and expected: people in whom high intelligence and markedly anxious features converged had, in general, greater density of white matter. 

This increased density, in statistical terms, could account for the intellectual power of these people and, at the same time, for their tendencies to chronic and generalized anxiety, since the white matter has been associated with emotional control. 

Evolutionary explanation

In the evolutionary course of our species, part of the scientific community believes that the development of intelligence and the disposition to experience anxiety ran hand in hand.

The reason could be none other than the fact that, in order to improve the survival of our species, it was useful to optimize the analysis and processing of information to be able to anticipate dangers.

Thus, by developing a greater density of white matter, that intelligence necessary for survival would be promoted. On the other hand, as the nervous system has faster and more efficient ways of communicating and transmitting information, anxious states would appear more frequently.

These conclusions also lead us to a possible theoretical explanation of the emotional and behavioral blockage that involves disproportionate amount of anxiety. Thus, at the moment when anxiety reaches excessively high levels, saturation of the nervous communication pathways occurs and the potential for intelligence decreases sharply, causing a sensation of paralysis in the person.

As we have seen, having a highly intelligent mind is, in most cases, an element of desirability for many people. But coins have two sides and, as we have seen, a high degree of intelligence can bring with it traits of anxiety and difficulty in emotional control.

Intelligence is important, but is being smart really everything ?