How rationality differs from intelligence

The notion that the more intelligent a person is, the more rational they are seems to be grounded in common sense. So why is it that people with high IQs can also believe in fantastical nonsense that isn’t supported by science or even the bare minimum of evidence?

Unfortunately for those who believe that “smarter” is equivalent to “more reasonable,” reality paints a different picture. Research suggests that intelligence and rationality are weakly correlated. Or, to put it simply, being more intelligent doesn’t necessarily mean you’re more rational, and possessing average or below-average intelligence doesn’t always mean you’re incapable of reason.

In an article they wrote for the New York Times, Michigan State University professor David Z. Hambrick and graduate student Alexander P. Burgoyne discussed several studies that demonstrate the differences between rationality and intelligence.

Linda

One of the earliest and most influential studies exploring the phenomenon was conducted in the 1970s by psychologists Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky. In one of their tests, they had subjects read a personality sketch about an individual named Linda:

“Linda is 31 years old, single, outspoken and very bright. She majored in philosophy. As a student, she was deeply concerned with issues of discrimination and social justice, and also participated in antinuclear demonstrations.”

The participants were then asked to judge which one of the following two statements was more likely to be true:

“(A) Linda is a bank teller or (B) Linda is a bank teller and is active in the feminist movement.”

Eighty-five percent of the volunteers selected B.

The problem with this choice is that it’s a conjunction fallacy, which is when we mistakenly believe that two events occurring together is more probable than only one of those events occurring. The fact is there isn’t any real evidence in the personality sketch that proves Linda is both a bank teller AND a feminist. So statement A would have been the more logical choice.

As you can guess, Kahneman and Amos Tversky’s studies revealed that even extremely intelligent people can have irrational thoughts and beliefs. Instead of using reason, we humans often resort to relying on intuition when making choices.

‘Dysrationalia’

In the 1990s, psychologists such as Keith Stanovich conducted further studies about intelligence and rationality. Stanovich and his colleagues had several hundred participants complete IQ tests along with tests similar to the Linda conundrum.

What Stanovich and his research team discovered was that irrationality—or “dysrationalia” as he called it—bears a weak correlation to IQ. What this means is that an individual boasting high IQ is as prone to dysrationalia as someone with lower IQ.

“Knowledge projection from an island of false beliefs might explain the phenomenon of otherwise intelligence people who get caught in a domain-specific web of falsity and because of projection tendencies cannot escape (e.g., the otherwise competent physical scientists who believe in creationism),” Stanovich stated in one his papers. “Indeed, such individuals often use their considerable computational power to rationalize their beliefs and to ward off the arguments of skeptics. The cognitive machinery recruited to aid in knowledge projection might be extremely potent in individuals high in cognitive capacity—but when the projection occurs from an island of false belief it merely results in a belief network even more divergent from that of individuals not engaged in such projection or with less computational power.”

In 2008, Stanovich and his team even demonstrated that the higher your IQ, the more likely you are to commit the conjunction fallacy.

Hope for the irrational

So let’s say you’re a person of average intelligence who also entertains highly irrational thoughts. The bad news? You can’t improve your intelligence. The good news? You can improve rationality—through training.

In psychological research by Carey Morewedge and his team, 200 volunteers were made to take tests to determine how susceptible they were to cognitive biases related to decision-making.

Afterwards, one group of subjects was instructed to watch a video that provided information about such biases.

A second group was instead made to play a computer game specifically developed to reduce decision-making biases in people. Additionally, after playing the game, each participant underwent training that informed them of particular biases. Lastly, each was provided feedback about their performance.

Immediately following the completion of their respective activities, both groups were tested again on their decision-making habits. They were tested a final time two months later.

The scientists observed that the group that participated in the computer-related training showed a significant and enduring improvement in their decision-making.

Though a reduction in decision-making biases was also observed in the group that watched the video, their improvement was not as great as the computer group’s.

In our present reality, we find ourselves on a planet populated by an irrational majority. All it takes is a second to find someone who believes in Bigfoot, or voodoo, or vampires, or cosmic overlords who will reward us with paradise if we give enough money to their smarmy, well-dressed ministers. But it’s good to know even the least rational among us can learn to think more reasonably. Perhaps if our various institutions could make an effort to design training programs to help weed out our irrational biases, we could one day live in a world where people’s decisions are guided by logic and critical thinking. — BM, GMA News