From August through September 2022, a survey was circulated within private forums to parents of sons with Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria. These private groups were formed to provide support for parents who are skeptical of their son’s sudden self-diagnosis as “trans,” and generally cautious about the popular model of “affirmation” offered by therapists, schools, and medical practitioners.
n=124 A relatively small sample size. Mine is PG, highly introverted and very sensitive. It would be interesting to note how many also self-id other labels?
Excellent post and comments thread. A component I'm not seeing addressed (not saying it's not out there; but I'm not seeing it) is the role of environmental endocrine disruption from Day 1 (and subsequently nonstop) in boys' lives.
Babies and children are all massively affected by chemicals, plastics, herbicides/pesticides and every imaginable pharma products via our water supply. This tsunami of toxicity by necessity damages males. The pharma we give them adds insult to injury. The biological feminization of males due to environmental factors isn't being addressed enough.
Parents naturally look inward for causes when the causes are outside. We don't blame a bird when its young are eaten by a predator. Our kids are being deliberately attacked by predators daily in schools (ideology funded and driven by globalism), by medicine/psychology, and by all media. As a result, families MUST BECOME more on-the-ground activist than they are currently.
Even though I'm the parent of a girl, I found this data super interesting. Gifted, gifted, gifted....we hear a lot about the autistic cohort, but nowhere near as much about the gifted ones. Mine falls into the gifted cohort. When she had her educational testing done (we thought she might have ADHD), the psychologist pointed out that many gifted kids, due to being out of the box thinkers, tend to be more fluid in their identities at this age and not want to be pigeonholed. The ironic thing is that they don't realize how much they pigeonhole themselves far too soon and go down this path that will completely foreclose options to them later. We have got to start addressing the gifted kid correlation more.
I guess I could have been gifted. I was good at math and English and science. Good grades, bright, all that stuff.
Big deal.
I was socially awkward extending into my adulthood. Heck, I was afraid of a lot of my job supervisors well into my 30s.
I used to turn my nose up at industrial arts. Now I would be glad to trade one of my graduate degrees for a plumbing license.
P.E. was a nightmare in my day. A couple decades ago I think I heard a story on NPR about reforming P.E. so the kids do a lot of individualized calisthenics and compete against their previous score, rather against the champ athletes in the class. "that would have been great," I thought.
And your peers don't care much about your math test score.
I think the point here is not on a micro but at a macro level. It appears, those captured by this ideology are gifted gen z. Why is that? What is lacking in this cohort that we need to understand. How did this cohort become indoctrinated?
We want these kids to be healthy, happy and well adjusted. As a society, we need their intelligence to solve problems and run a sane society. The US minimizes intelligence yet exalt a top athlete. Partaking in this helps no one, least of all the gifted captured kids.
"Gifted" is hard to define. Is it high test scores? Does it mean a talent for things involving screens? When we think of the gifted student, he's usually good at math and gives the right answers. But can he build a cabinet? Can he change the oil of a car? We don't often call those kids gifted. There was that old conflict in that 80s movie, the Breakfast Club. The "brain" thought shop class would be an easy A because "Have you seen the kids who take shop?
A lot of what gets taught are these abstracts and manipulating them. There's a value to that. But there's also a value to working things in the real world.
One thing I find of very little value is the political indoctrination stuff. But I guess that's useful to certain influential movements that want to increase their influence by having an early and impressionable audience.
Is the transgender student catching on to those messages as well? "Male is bad, straight is bad, the family is bad, be an independent Marxists who does whatever makes them happy and F the system." That message gets its converts. And those converts are less likely to be the type to give their parents grandchildren.
@jonah, the concern about giftedness is that they tend to be out of the box thinkers who don't like to conform; they like to question, they will often take up causes of those they perceive to be less fortunate. Maybe in the past they'd have expressed that type of behavior differently; now, it seems they're a bit susceptible to gender ideology. And you're right, many gifted kids lack common sense, and that skill should be cultivated as much as anything else. But I think that's a completely different issue and conversation than what's being discussed here.
There was an old joke about how the "goth" kids would say they were rebelling against the conformity of normal people. But in so doing, they conformed to the trappings of a different sub group -- the dress, music, mannerisms and culture of the goth kids. Conforming to a group that prided themselves on non conforming.
Funny you say that, Jonah. I think that is definitely at play. If you look at the girls who are NB and trans in their teens, there is a definite "uniform," hairstyle, music choices, interest in anime, etc. We've actually pointed that out to our teen, and she laughs it off, because in her mind, she couldn't possibly NOT be unique.
Can someone please give me a referral for a therapist that specializes in gender identity issues and trauma that will not just affirm my son and believe that "he is the best expert on himself". I need to find someone so that medicalization can be stopped or delayed. The therapist shouldn't be an openly anti trans type, because then my 18 yo son won't even talk to them. My son agreed to delay medicalization for 6 months if I can arrange appropriate therapy (hope!). Please, if anyone has a referral- it can be video sessions so location isn't a big issue, but we are in Illinois.
There's likely a a wait list, but try Sasha or Stella from Gender A Wider Lens Podcast. If they are filled, they may have referral names. Good luck. Our son fell into the gender abyss at 19. It's heartbreaking.
I was a transvestite for many years. My ideation -- fantasy -- ranked up when I was 12 or 13. Internet back then was dial up modems and America Online. None the less, I did talk to other transvestites via the internet. I didn't "come out" more openly -- pursuing it -- in my mid twenties. Though I confessed to certain people at 21.
I identify a lot with the "intelligent, socially awkward, poor at sports" attributes. The "coming out" opened new social avenues for me. Like it or not, it was a shared hobby with other people and one that had sexuality associated with that were unavailable to me in the more normal spheres.
I've given it up now. And I never messed with my body. But on the other hand, it was a time before internet saturation, before a cultural and political drive to push this, and before the insane isolation policies of Covid.
I wish I could give some support for these boys.
Some tools I would recommend that were very helpful to me -- that even though I occasionally would don a dress or a wig I NEVER took a pill of estrogen or testosterone blocker -- was some of the men's rights movement. Robert Bly, William Farrell, and today I would recommend Jordan Peterson. Men's esteem have taken a beating for decades, and when one feels that one cannot be a man without being evil, then why not change? A potential solution is to learn you can be good as a man. My ultimate solution that led to me ending it forever was relating to my wife -- I could do MORE good as a man. My "hobby" didn't make me better at relating to other people, in spite of the conceit that it could.
Thanks for this. It really bothers me how we demonize boys.
People need to get over these Nonsense ideas that any of this is Left or Right.
I’ve been a Democrat my entire life. Frankly, I can’t be a democrat anymore after what has happened these past 3 years.
But that won’t turn me into a Republican.
Protecting Kids isn’t a Political thing. Every person has an interest in Honestly Protecting kids and making sure they are Psychologically healthy.
I listened to Jordan Peterson simply because Tribal Women on the Left (who show no capability of Reflective Functioning as far as I can tell) drove me away.
His lectures are great I think. Everyone would benefit from ACTUALLY LISTENING!
I guess you could say I became a Republican some days after 9/11. (Not precisely due to 9/11 but due to some after effects). Or more accurately, I was first disillusioned with the left.
Today, if Democrats are a domestic abuser, Republicans for the most part are the enablers who will say "He only hits you because he loves you." There are a few that might help you get out, but only a few. I don't expect many reversals coming up after the red wave. Best we can hope for is some time on the pause button.
But at the moment, even a Republican who does absolutely nothing whatsoever while in office is still better than Democrats pushing Drag Queen Story Hour.
Okay.... enough politics.
On Peterson -- he was asked recently if he would accept being an advocate for the Incels -- the involuntary celibate men -- he paused and said: "Why not? No one else will. Might as well be me. Women have high standards, as well they should! But have you seen these men, isolated, alone, without hope of intimacy in their lives?" And he started to weep.
I was invisible to women in my early 20s. Absolutely invisible. It is very hard to convey the despair of that. When I first went to the night clubs dressed as a girl -- I had attention. Granted, it was other men who were buying my drinks and wanting to get in my pants. But AT LEAST I HAD ATTENTION! Never.... NEVER had anyone tried to get my attention like that. Usually it was repulsion if I paid attention to them. Even women -- granted the women who go to night clubs of that type are their own kind of breed -- but even they were far more willing to interact with me if I was dressed as a girl than if I was in my day to day male stuff.
After spending a decade married and my whole way of interacting with women has changed tremendously -- I still remember those early years. The fear, the loneliness and the idealism. The attention was a huge incentive.
I agree. I have a boy so I have a very vested interest in stopping the demonization of them. I also live in society and I'm watching males crumble due to what society is doing to them.
Jordan Peterson is awesome. Especially for boys! My son listens to him.
Warren Farrell wrote "the myth of male power." He was a feminist for a long time but then got interested in men's issues. His popularity and support dried up overnight. Still, he defends men against a number of the charges that the feminists lay on them, and mentions downsides of being a man that feminism will not recognize. (Being sent off to war, giving up a seat on the lifeboat, more likely to be homeless, etc.)
Robert Bly was a poet who wrote, among other things "Iron John." He found a kind of masculinity in analyzing the old Grimm Fairy Tale (and other bits of culture). One of his positions was that men suffer from a lack of initiation into the adult world. Some Indigenous tribes may have a difficult, challenging rite of passage to turn adolescent boys into men. We have very little of that. (I don't think my Bar Mitzvah was sufficient).
But I think Jordan Peterson probably surpasses both of these authors. They still can be worthwhile, though.
That also makes a lot of sense. Girls have a physical thing that happens to them that ppl have long associated with passing into womanhood. There isn't anything like that for boys. 🤔 Very good points. Thanks.
Yeah, there is a .... how do you put it... a conceit that women are more "in tune" to the natural, even to G-d, because there's no ignoring a period, etc.
In Judaism (you know, becoming more knowledgable about my religion actually also helped me pull away from transgenderism... not immediately, it was a gradual thing, but still...). In Judaism... the men have more commandments to fulfill than the women. Some critics think this is because of patriarchy or male privileges. But is actually the opposite -- the men need more reminders of the divine, because yes, our bodies don't remind us on its own every month or so.
Very early on in Genesis -- G-d says a passage that is not often translated well. Some say G-d looks at Adam and says: "It is not good for man to be alone." The supposition is that he created Eve for Adam's benefit.
But another translation is that G-d says: "It is not good THAT man be alone."
The word "For" implies women is needed for man's benefit.
The word "That" implies that women is needed for the world's benefit. Because a man alone is not a "good thing." Not good for who? Himself? The world? Not exactly clear. But here the woman's creation is more to stop the danger of a lone man.
Well, modern culture sure doesn't care much for traditional marriage relationships. Married people have kids, and then go to town hall meetings and advocate for their children, and give all sorts of headaches to the government officials.... be easier if they were all single and lonely and stayed in their places.
"Modern culture sure doesn't care much for traditional marriage relationships."
Ain't that the truth. Lol They'd rather it be more like Brave New World. Everyone is owned by everyone. I'm reminded of BLM's website that used to say (until they got backlash about it) they wanted to disrupt traditional families and make it more like being raised by a village. (I paraphrased)
Brave new world! That’s a excellent citation. Been so long since I read it. But yes. Casual sex. Raised as a group. No parents just test tubes. And drugs when you’re unhappy.
BLM yes. The black community suffers terribly from broken families. And BLMs solution is to smash a broken leg with a sledgehammer.
It should be clear at this point that the so called “experts” in Academic Medicine working at Children’s hospitals are either Completely Incompetent or Extremely Malevolent towards kids. (They’re probably Both).
Thanks for posting. So many unknowns even in good surveys.
What we have always known is that pre- and puberty are times of confusion, development, and experimentation for kids trying to sort out emerging sexuality. For example, erections in locker rooms around other boys has never been the hallmark of boys being homosexual, but now, any level of "same-sex attraction" makes a boy think he's gay. Girls, too. When my granddaughter was eight, she told me she was gay because her BFF was a girl. She had no idea what "gay" meant, because she was still not sexually aware, but her school had already planted that seed. As bad as it is now, I expect the trans market to increase as more schools intentionally introduce "gender" confusion beginning with pre-schoolers and kindergarteners. Vulvas are "usually" found on bodies of girls; penises are "usually" found on bodies of boys' "people with those types of reproduction systems." By the time this generation of five-year olds get to adolescence, they will honestly be able meet the clinical definition of gender dysphoria that they have thought they were another gender for years. I hope and pray that I'm wrong, but I'm afraid I'm not. We need to take back the narrative between sex and gender and explain the difference. Never affirm a lie, but share the truth in a loving, compassionate way.
Exactly. Especially when the schools are telling them or encouraging them to "explore" genders. 99% of these kids would never even think of this if it wasn't implanted into their heads by teachers (the biggest culprit) and now the media, Hollywood, etc.
These feel like kids who are *in their heads* too much, and out of contact with their bodies. I think this is why puberty is curative for many: it puts you right into contact with your body. If I had a son like this I'd be tempted to hike the Pacific Crest trail, or surf, or build a cabin with him.
We have made too many changes to 'normal' babyhood & childhood and removed some of the key inputs (carrying on body is key) needed for development, and the reliable launch of a stable bio-psycho-social selves. We don't have enough alloparents. Too many devices and distractions. Not enough nature. Too much relying on one overburdened parent instead of 'the village' -- which is an insurance policy for a hard/weird kid, that *somebody* will "get" them in the larger group.
I think many of these kids have functional deficits due to these constrictions and social changes. Certain kids probably need more reinforcement of lessons, modeled by numerous adults, so they are more affected by being isolated... those with a dyslexia for emotional learning, and a need for extra modeling that isn't received. This lack results in a lack of a firm "me," in anxiety, etc.
All these conditions are WAY UP.
Boys need a lot more time to hit developmental milestones than girls too. Girls are thinking about social things years ahead of boys, front-loading unanswerable questions (=anxiety). Boys can be uniquely sensitive to early disruptions, too, due to their 'extra-young' neurobiology. Last, boys are robbed of nurture by our culture's macho, tough it out, don't-cry values that are imposed on them.
We need to overhaul modern practices, and re-imbue things that help kids FEEL, Ground in their bodies, and Launch with emotional stability/ basic self confidence. Because that USED to be the norm. All this mental distress in the young is a new condition of humanity.
Maybe early "school" is too big a stress on later-to-develop boys? Lining up in lines, 'behaving' when they can't really do that yet? Maybe we really do need grandmothers to have enough mature modeling and lap time, to learn to regulate our very sophisticated brains?
We are FAR more nuturing to boys (kids, in general, even) than we ever have been and this is only happening now. Not before when the "tough it out" values were much more normal and widespread.
We need more men teaching boys to be men and less feminization of society. We are much too focused on feelings and emotions. I'm not saying that it should be the other extreme, but we are constantly digging into kids emotions and feelings. We need to just let kids be kids and be good role models.
That is untrue when based on 40-50 years ago. There was a big debate in the 1970s re sending 3 and 4 year olds to preschool. Now we send babies to daycare.
We are a Nation full of adults who don’t have a clue how to raise babies, toddlers and young Children so that they have a Secure attachment. We don’t even understand that secure attachments is the basis of all healthy psychological growth & it’s been purposefully hidden as far as I can tell. I went to a 4 year medical school. I did a 3 year Peds Residency in a Big Program and did 20 years of AAP approved CME.
No mention of attachment, secure base distortions, Bowlby, Main, Ainsworth. NADA. Just psyche drugs. We are giving kids psyche drugs for Attachment trauma.
The Early daycare for Infants is a Complete Disaster. So is using a screen as a Babysitter. Screens result in severe sensory deprivation/maternal deprivation & anxious, disorganized kids who are easily Propagandized.
But nothing will change by just giving Mothers time with their infants w/o teaching Psychologists, Doctors, Teachers, Parents, everyone in society about how the Brain Develops through a healthy relationship w/a Secure Base that can Mentalize/engage in reflective functioning. And children need socialization through play. (Crime Scene tape on Playgrounds precludes this. So does antisocial distancing).
We gave all these mothers of Newborns time during Covid but that study of Babies born during CV done out of Brown demonstrated that the crazy & reckless Covid Fear Porn fed to these mothers resulted in 22 point IQ drop in their babies. There is NO WAY these kids have a secure attachment after that.
The AAP put out Anticipatory guidance that basically told mothers to be freaked out about Breast Feeding their infants. My guess is babies became disorganized picking up anxious energy from a very confused & recklessly panicked mother.
So, the only way to have a Sane, Non-violent world is to make sure babies have a secure attachment.
So When are we going to talk about how to do this as a society in an open and honest way without the Corruption of Cancel Culture?
Daycare(and schools, in general) ...where they are digging into the kids heads about feelins and emotions...
Also, you said before that there is too much relying on the parent instead of the village. This contrasts with your comment here that we are sending them off to daycare...the village. So you simultaneously believe we are relying on the parent too much while also saying we rely on the village (daycare) too much.
I 100% believe that we rely on daycare too much and that kids need to be at home with their parents. While I believe that kind of nurturing is important and needs to increase BADLY, I do not agree that we need to continue this sissifying and feminization of boys. That is part of the problem.
Daycare = serial losses, low-paid strangers; same-age peers.
Village = kin, intimacy, neighbors, multi-age peers... a natural network that surrounds Mom, well known people, concording values. Village is totally different.
Why is sissifying or feminizing that I suggest?
I raised two feeling, sharing, lap-time boys and have two manly men at 25 and 31.
People need to learn how to cope with their *feelings*. It's called Emotional Self Regulation and it is the CORE of feeling a confident sense of self. It's a human skill that boys and girls both need. Boys have a harder time learning it because they have slower neurological maturation.
My sissifying comment was due to you saying boys are being robbed of nurture by "macho, tough it out" values.
Yes, you can teach kids how to cope without tinkering in their brains all day, like schools are doing with things like SEL, for instance. You can also teach coping without babying and feminizing them. We did it throughout all of life before now.
A secure attachment for Boys results in Compassionate & Empathic Men.
The “SEL” being done in Schools - Is Manipulation being done by People who don’t know anything about Child Development.
These people could supervise Play making sure no anxious preoccupied or avoidant/disorganized kid gets bullied or becomes overly aggressive to a Peer but doing the “Privilege” walks etc is Pure Manipulation.
I did all my work with poor Rural White Boys. They are Doing just as Poorly as Inner city Black Kids.
Even Alicia Lieberman put out a paper that shows that Race and Poverty isn’t the deciding factor. So did Stephen Soumi and James Heckman.
The difference is the quality of Maternal Attachment aka Maternal Care.
Yes, Prescott looked at the anthropological studies in tribes showing that a permissive sexual attitude in adolescence provides the last 20 percent of variance in violent societies. Okay, let’s look at that. BUT what is being done in school (by people who in my mind are engaging in incredibly unethical behavior such as keeping secrets from parents, cross dressing kids, keeping a separate medical record) IS NOT what he was referring to.
Messages are being given to white kids that are not at all subtle that scream, “You are a Bad Person for Being White & Male. You are NO GOOD as you are.”
This is absolutely NOT APPROPRIATE! There are kids coming to school from families riddled with Violence and Abuse only to be Abused even more by adults with an Abusive, Manipulative, Malevolent Agenda. This is not what school is for.
I want a non-violent society. This is achieved by providing a secure attachment with safety & love to all children.
I agree. We don’t have this so called “Toxic Masculinity” anymore. We tell boys they are Vile for being born Male and White & the only way to escape that is to become Trans. This is pure, vicious propaganda.
The other problem is Early Daycare & Screens.
The early daycare leads to insecure attachments (avoidant which leads to narcissism and schizoid - looks like & may even be pretty much the same as autism. It’s certainly the same Phenotypically). The Screens solidify the attachment with something non-human & this precludes social play which is necessary for child socialization. All work w/infants and animal research show that Screens can’t activate Mirror Neurons and the origins of Empathy is Neonatal Imitation through Mirror Neurons.
We are being Purposefully guided by Social Science Research into a Trans Funnel - first transsexual; eventually transhumanism. It’s purposeful.
I was on my State’s Developmental Behavioral Pediatrics Committee. When Covid Happened - it was clear, the panic and obscene reckless paranoia over a Virus less dangerous to kids than Flu was causing serious problems. Autistic Kids were killing themselves.
The only Kid I knew who died of Covid actually died in early May 2020 at 15 years old from the Non-pharmaceutical Interventions (NPIs). The Masking & “Lockdowns” led this 15 y/o autistic male to Hang himself.
I tried to talk to my DB group. They didn’t care and I was basically cancelled. The head of the committee still goes on Podcasts saying that the rate of Trans-Kids is increasing because now society is being forced to approve. She was the President of My State AAP. The entire thing is ludricious.
It’s ALL BOGUS. We are taking traumatized & confused kids and Abusing them in Hideous ways.
Cross-sex Hormones and Sex Change Operations don’t treat Childhood attachment Trauma.
I agree with you about walking the Coast. I’d have them out walking the Appalachian Trial & we would Camp in the Mountains. We’d pick apples and figure out how to collect edible mushrooms. We would read books on how to create a Food Forest.
And I would smash every screen with a Hammer. There’s a reason that Logo is of an Apple with a Bite out of it
Exactly. No wonder boys want to be girls when they're told they're ghastly by media, schools (the state), Hollywood, etc. and they're overly feminized. They're not taught to be boys any longer. Far too many have no fathers and have no male role models to model manhood. Too many are overly protected and babied by mothers. Etc etc.
And all kids are having their brains tinkered with and having them dwell on their feelings and emotions constantly.
I am getting more and more concerned about this notion of "giftedness". What again is the definition of this? Most kids are clever, and parents generally feel that their child is clever. But what evidence that these kids are more than normally clever?
It is a complicated issue, for sure. I personally don't have much respect for the IQ tests but I did test my daughter when she was 4. I did it just to get her into a nice school, as did tons of other parents where I live. She passed the test as did so many other kids from the "educated" families. Especially at a young age , the test pretty much just identified involved educated families where kids are read to. So, I never really thought much of it, I just used the test for a utilitarian purpose. I saw the kids in her "gifted" school and they were just regular kids with only a few clearly gifted. I do think the gifted label is a bit of a burden psychologically for the kids so maybe there is something there, the burden of the label and feeling like you can't live up to it? On the other hand, when I read detransitoners I am constantly in awe at how eloquent and intelligent they are so it is possible that the connection with giftedness is real. In which case I wonder if the gifted kids are victims of envy from their peers. (And then there is autism connection of course).
Common definition of "gifted" is IQ over 130 = top 2-3 percent = 2+ standard deviations, as measured by a test like OLSAT, NNAT, or WISC. Smart kids but not super-smart.
What surprises me about this study is the super-smarts. They report that kids with a one-in-a-thousand IQ form 41% of ROGD boys. THREE HUNDRED TIMES elevated rate. Even if the parents exaggerate, it's still high. And it supports the idea that male ROGD is a disease of the high-IQ.
I wonder if it partly is due to the fact that these kids are in many cases not physically active, and do mostly stuff involving computers and books. I was 'gifted' and did mostly non-athletic stuff.
I think it may be a combination of the fact that intellectually "gifted"/very bright kids live in their heads more and are thus more susceptible to mind bugs (which Gender Ideology is) and that they feel extra social isolation if they do not have many intellectual peers with whom they can connect. Hey, maybe some of these gifted kids are transing in order to connect with other gifted kids and have a peer group (which is very important when you become a teen)?
I'm not sure how you are defining clever, but IQ tests can ID kids who are above average. The more deviations above average, the more gifted. Spatial and working memory are just a couple of subsets on the tests. Anecdotally, in parent groups we talk about how smart/gifted our kids are and wonder how/why they are getting captured. Many have had some type of formal test.
There are different tests that can be given to meet the criteria of gifted and talented. G&T has never been about promoting academics though. Those kids have always been targeted as lab rats to become leaders in progressive ideologies.
I understand what you mean, and people may be gifted in different areas. This survey asked parents if their son had cognitive (IQ) testing and what the approximate score was. Of course, while these boys may be academically gifted, it shows majority struggle socially.
That's an interesting point about different areas. Especially at high levels, kids show a lot of unevenness (Billy is >99.9% at math but 50% at spelling, etc.)
I wonder if anyone has more granular data about sub-intelligences. Like "ROGD tracks with verbal but not quantitative"
I still want a study of Big Five Personality Traits and ROGD. That just might explain the girls.
Before we all move on to other articles, I have to thank the authors and to point out that the IQ data is SHOCKING:
OBSERVED VS. EXPECTED
<90: 0.81% vs. 25.24% = 0.03X the expected rate
90-110: 1.61% vs. 49.52% = 0.03X
110-130: 16.13% vs. 22.96% = 0.7X
130-145: 33.87% vs. 2.14% = 16X
145-160: 41.13% vs. 0.13% = 312X
>160: 6.45% vs. 0.003% = 2,150X
Two thousand times elevated rate! If this survey is anywhere near accurate, it's screaming to us that male ROGD is a disease of the high-IQ, period.
Fine, assume parents exaggerate. Claw back a whole SD. We still get shockingly elevated rates, and the higher the IQ the more elevated:
OBSERVED VS. EXPECTED
<90: 1.61% vs. 25.24% = 0.06X
90-110: 16.13% vs. 49.52% = 0.33X
110-130: 33.87% vs. 22.96% = 1.5X
130-145: 41.13% vs. 2.14% = 19X
145-160: 6.45% vs. 0.13% = 49X
>160: nope
To summarize the clawback data, gifted = 47.58% vs. 2.27% = 21X.
This fits with what Littman's original paper found six years ago, a 19X elevated rate for gifted kids (male and female).
n=124 A relatively small sample size. Mine is PG, highly introverted and very sensitive. It would be interesting to note how many also self-id other labels?
Excellent post and comments thread. A component I'm not seeing addressed (not saying it's not out there; but I'm not seeing it) is the role of environmental endocrine disruption from Day 1 (and subsequently nonstop) in boys' lives.
Babies and children are all massively affected by chemicals, plastics, herbicides/pesticides and every imaginable pharma products via our water supply. This tsunami of toxicity by necessity damages males. The pharma we give them adds insult to injury. The biological feminization of males due to environmental factors isn't being addressed enough.
Parents naturally look inward for causes when the causes are outside. We don't blame a bird when its young are eaten by a predator. Our kids are being deliberately attacked by predators daily in schools (ideology funded and driven by globalism), by medicine/psychology, and by all media. As a result, families MUST BECOME more on-the-ground activist than they are currently.
It may be that their characters are more “elastic “ and they are open to new ideas.
And the autistic community thought the "treatments" of past generations were barbaric! At least ABA didn't render one infertile!
Even though I'm the parent of a girl, I found this data super interesting. Gifted, gifted, gifted....we hear a lot about the autistic cohort, but nowhere near as much about the gifted ones. Mine falls into the gifted cohort. When she had her educational testing done (we thought she might have ADHD), the psychologist pointed out that many gifted kids, due to being out of the box thinkers, tend to be more fluid in their identities at this age and not want to be pigeonholed. The ironic thing is that they don't realize how much they pigeonhole themselves far too soon and go down this path that will completely foreclose options to them later. We have got to start addressing the gifted kid correlation more.
I guess I could have been gifted. I was good at math and English and science. Good grades, bright, all that stuff.
Big deal.
I was socially awkward extending into my adulthood. Heck, I was afraid of a lot of my job supervisors well into my 30s.
I used to turn my nose up at industrial arts. Now I would be glad to trade one of my graduate degrees for a plumbing license.
P.E. was a nightmare in my day. A couple decades ago I think I heard a story on NPR about reforming P.E. so the kids do a lot of individualized calisthenics and compete against their previous score, rather against the champ athletes in the class. "that would have been great," I thought.
And your peers don't care much about your math test score.
I think the point here is not on a micro but at a macro level. It appears, those captured by this ideology are gifted gen z. Why is that? What is lacking in this cohort that we need to understand. How did this cohort become indoctrinated?
We want these kids to be healthy, happy and well adjusted. As a society, we need their intelligence to solve problems and run a sane society. The US minimizes intelligence yet exalt a top athlete. Partaking in this helps no one, least of all the gifted captured kids.
"Gifted" is hard to define. Is it high test scores? Does it mean a talent for things involving screens? When we think of the gifted student, he's usually good at math and gives the right answers. But can he build a cabinet? Can he change the oil of a car? We don't often call those kids gifted. There was that old conflict in that 80s movie, the Breakfast Club. The "brain" thought shop class would be an easy A because "Have you seen the kids who take shop?
A lot of what gets taught are these abstracts and manipulating them. There's a value to that. But there's also a value to working things in the real world.
One thing I find of very little value is the political indoctrination stuff. But I guess that's useful to certain influential movements that want to increase their influence by having an early and impressionable audience.
Is the transgender student catching on to those messages as well? "Male is bad, straight is bad, the family is bad, be an independent Marxists who does whatever makes them happy and F the system." That message gets its converts. And those converts are less likely to be the type to give their parents grandchildren.
@jonah, the concern about giftedness is that they tend to be out of the box thinkers who don't like to conform; they like to question, they will often take up causes of those they perceive to be less fortunate. Maybe in the past they'd have expressed that type of behavior differently; now, it seems they're a bit susceptible to gender ideology. And you're right, many gifted kids lack common sense, and that skill should be cultivated as much as anything else. But I think that's a completely different issue and conversation than what's being discussed here.
There was an old joke about how the "goth" kids would say they were rebelling against the conformity of normal people. But in so doing, they conformed to the trappings of a different sub group -- the dress, music, mannerisms and culture of the goth kids. Conforming to a group that prided themselves on non conforming.
Is that sort of what's happening here?
Funny you say that, Jonah. I think that is definitely at play. If you look at the girls who are NB and trans in their teens, there is a definite "uniform," hairstyle, music choices, interest in anime, etc. We've actually pointed that out to our teen, and she laughs it off, because in her mind, she couldn't possibly NOT be unique.
I too have a gifted girl with anxiety.
What time frame was this? Just curious as to where society was in the trans debate.
The gifted correlation is important.
The self-reported IQs here imply that 81.45% of ROGD boys are gifted (have a 2.27% IQ). That's a 36X elevated rate.
Littman's original sample found 19X.
Does anyone know of other studies of IQ and ROGD?
Can someone please give me a referral for a therapist that specializes in gender identity issues and trauma that will not just affirm my son and believe that "he is the best expert on himself". I need to find someone so that medicalization can be stopped or delayed. The therapist shouldn't be an openly anti trans type, because then my 18 yo son won't even talk to them. My son agreed to delay medicalization for 6 months if I can arrange appropriate therapy (hope!). Please, if anyone has a referral- it can be video sessions so location isn't a big issue, but we are in Illinois.
Please email me at Pitt@genspect.org
Look for a therapist via GETA (Gender Exploratory Therapists Association).
Wow, this is an incredible find. It’s about time!
Scroll through the About Us page at SEGM.org, the Society for Evidence Based Gender Medicine.
There's likely a a wait list, but try Sasha or Stella from Gender A Wider Lens Podcast. If they are filled, they may have referral names. Good luck. Our son fell into the gender abyss at 19. It's heartbreaking.
Thank you all for your ideas
I was a transvestite for many years. My ideation -- fantasy -- ranked up when I was 12 or 13. Internet back then was dial up modems and America Online. None the less, I did talk to other transvestites via the internet. I didn't "come out" more openly -- pursuing it -- in my mid twenties. Though I confessed to certain people at 21.
I identify a lot with the "intelligent, socially awkward, poor at sports" attributes. The "coming out" opened new social avenues for me. Like it or not, it was a shared hobby with other people and one that had sexuality associated with that were unavailable to me in the more normal spheres.
I've given it up now. And I never messed with my body. But on the other hand, it was a time before internet saturation, before a cultural and political drive to push this, and before the insane isolation policies of Covid.
I wish I could give some support for these boys.
Some tools I would recommend that were very helpful to me -- that even though I occasionally would don a dress or a wig I NEVER took a pill of estrogen or testosterone blocker -- was some of the men's rights movement. Robert Bly, William Farrell, and today I would recommend Jordan Peterson. Men's esteem have taken a beating for decades, and when one feels that one cannot be a man without being evil, then why not change? A potential solution is to learn you can be good as a man. My ultimate solution that led to me ending it forever was relating to my wife -- I could do MORE good as a man. My "hobby" didn't make me better at relating to other people, in spite of the conceit that it could.
Did you mean to recommend Warren (not William) Farrell, author of “The Boy Crisis”?
Let me check.... yes, you're right! It's Warren Farrell, not William. I stand corrected!
Thanks for this. It really bothers me how we demonize boys.
People need to get over these Nonsense ideas that any of this is Left or Right.
I’ve been a Democrat my entire life. Frankly, I can’t be a democrat anymore after what has happened these past 3 years.
But that won’t turn me into a Republican.
Protecting Kids isn’t a Political thing. Every person has an interest in Honestly Protecting kids and making sure they are Psychologically healthy.
I listened to Jordan Peterson simply because Tribal Women on the Left (who show no capability of Reflective Functioning as far as I can tell) drove me away.
His lectures are great I think. Everyone would benefit from ACTUALLY LISTENING!
I guess you could say I became a Republican some days after 9/11. (Not precisely due to 9/11 but due to some after effects). Or more accurately, I was first disillusioned with the left.
Today, if Democrats are a domestic abuser, Republicans for the most part are the enablers who will say "He only hits you because he loves you." There are a few that might help you get out, but only a few. I don't expect many reversals coming up after the red wave. Best we can hope for is some time on the pause button.
But at the moment, even a Republican who does absolutely nothing whatsoever while in office is still better than Democrats pushing Drag Queen Story Hour.
Okay.... enough politics.
On Peterson -- he was asked recently if he would accept being an advocate for the Incels -- the involuntary celibate men -- he paused and said: "Why not? No one else will. Might as well be me. Women have high standards, as well they should! But have you seen these men, isolated, alone, without hope of intimacy in their lives?" And he started to weep.
I was invisible to women in my early 20s. Absolutely invisible. It is very hard to convey the despair of that. When I first went to the night clubs dressed as a girl -- I had attention. Granted, it was other men who were buying my drinks and wanting to get in my pants. But AT LEAST I HAD ATTENTION! Never.... NEVER had anyone tried to get my attention like that. Usually it was repulsion if I paid attention to them. Even women -- granted the women who go to night clubs of that type are their own kind of breed -- but even they were far more willing to interact with me if I was dressed as a girl than if I was in my day to day male stuff.
After spending a decade married and my whole way of interacting with women has changed tremendously -- I still remember those early years. The fear, the loneliness and the idealism. The attention was a huge incentive.
Wow, that really makes a lot of sense.
Thank you.
I agree. I have a boy so I have a very vested interest in stopping the demonization of them. I also live in society and I'm watching males crumble due to what society is doing to them.
Jordan Peterson is awesome. Especially for boys! My son listens to him.
Yes, Idk the other 2, but Jordan Peterson would be great for boys today. 👍🏻
Warren Farrell wrote "the myth of male power." He was a feminist for a long time but then got interested in men's issues. His popularity and support dried up overnight. Still, he defends men against a number of the charges that the feminists lay on them, and mentions downsides of being a man that feminism will not recognize. (Being sent off to war, giving up a seat on the lifeboat, more likely to be homeless, etc.)
Robert Bly was a poet who wrote, among other things "Iron John." He found a kind of masculinity in analyzing the old Grimm Fairy Tale (and other bits of culture). One of his positions was that men suffer from a lack of initiation into the adult world. Some Indigenous tribes may have a difficult, challenging rite of passage to turn adolescent boys into men. We have very little of that. (I don't think my Bar Mitzvah was sufficient).
But I think Jordan Peterson probably surpasses both of these authors. They still can be worthwhile, though.
That also makes a lot of sense. Girls have a physical thing that happens to them that ppl have long associated with passing into womanhood. There isn't anything like that for boys. 🤔 Very good points. Thanks.
Yeah, there is a .... how do you put it... a conceit that women are more "in tune" to the natural, even to G-d, because there's no ignoring a period, etc.
In Judaism (you know, becoming more knowledgable about my religion actually also helped me pull away from transgenderism... not immediately, it was a gradual thing, but still...). In Judaism... the men have more commandments to fulfill than the women. Some critics think this is because of patriarchy or male privileges. But is actually the opposite -- the men need more reminders of the divine, because yes, our bodies don't remind us on its own every month or so.
Very early on in Genesis -- G-d says a passage that is not often translated well. Some say G-d looks at Adam and says: "It is not good for man to be alone." The supposition is that he created Eve for Adam's benefit.
But another translation is that G-d says: "It is not good THAT man be alone."
The word "For" implies women is needed for man's benefit.
The word "That" implies that women is needed for the world's benefit. Because a man alone is not a "good thing." Not good for who? Himself? The world? Not exactly clear. But here the woman's creation is more to stop the danger of a lone man.
Well, modern culture sure doesn't care much for traditional marriage relationships. Married people have kids, and then go to town hall meetings and advocate for their children, and give all sorts of headaches to the government officials.... be easier if they were all single and lonely and stayed in their places.
"Modern culture sure doesn't care much for traditional marriage relationships."
Ain't that the truth. Lol They'd rather it be more like Brave New World. Everyone is owned by everyone. I'm reminded of BLM's website that used to say (until they got backlash about it) they wanted to disrupt traditional families and make it more like being raised by a village. (I paraphrased)
Brave new world! That’s a excellent citation. Been so long since I read it. But yes. Casual sex. Raised as a group. No parents just test tubes. And drugs when you’re unhappy.
BLM yes. The black community suffers terribly from broken families. And BLMs solution is to smash a broken leg with a sledgehammer.
Did you see Candace Owens movie about Blm?
It should be clear at this point that the so called “experts” in Academic Medicine working at Children’s hospitals are either Completely Incompetent or Extremely Malevolent towards kids. (They’re probably Both).
Did the survey ask whether there is a father in the home and how engaged he is with the children? I would love to see data on that.
Thanks for posting. So many unknowns even in good surveys.
What we have always known is that pre- and puberty are times of confusion, development, and experimentation for kids trying to sort out emerging sexuality. For example, erections in locker rooms around other boys has never been the hallmark of boys being homosexual, but now, any level of "same-sex attraction" makes a boy think he's gay. Girls, too. When my granddaughter was eight, she told me she was gay because her BFF was a girl. She had no idea what "gay" meant, because she was still not sexually aware, but her school had already planted that seed. As bad as it is now, I expect the trans market to increase as more schools intentionally introduce "gender" confusion beginning with pre-schoolers and kindergarteners. Vulvas are "usually" found on bodies of girls; penises are "usually" found on bodies of boys' "people with those types of reproduction systems." By the time this generation of five-year olds get to adolescence, they will honestly be able meet the clinical definition of gender dysphoria that they have thought they were another gender for years. I hope and pray that I'm wrong, but I'm afraid I'm not. We need to take back the narrative between sex and gender and explain the difference. Never affirm a lie, but share the truth in a loving, compassionate way.
Exactly. Especially when the schools are telling them or encouraging them to "explore" genders. 99% of these kids would never even think of this if it wasn't implanted into their heads by teachers (the biggest culprit) and now the media, Hollywood, etc.
These feel like kids who are *in their heads* too much, and out of contact with their bodies. I think this is why puberty is curative for many: it puts you right into contact with your body. If I had a son like this I'd be tempted to hike the Pacific Crest trail, or surf, or build a cabin with him.
We have made too many changes to 'normal' babyhood & childhood and removed some of the key inputs (carrying on body is key) needed for development, and the reliable launch of a stable bio-psycho-social selves. We don't have enough alloparents. Too many devices and distractions. Not enough nature. Too much relying on one overburdened parent instead of 'the village' -- which is an insurance policy for a hard/weird kid, that *somebody* will "get" them in the larger group.
I think many of these kids have functional deficits due to these constrictions and social changes. Certain kids probably need more reinforcement of lessons, modeled by numerous adults, so they are more affected by being isolated... those with a dyslexia for emotional learning, and a need for extra modeling that isn't received. This lack results in a lack of a firm "me," in anxiety, etc.
All these conditions are WAY UP.
Boys need a lot more time to hit developmental milestones than girls too. Girls are thinking about social things years ahead of boys, front-loading unanswerable questions (=anxiety). Boys can be uniquely sensitive to early disruptions, too, due to their 'extra-young' neurobiology. Last, boys are robbed of nurture by our culture's macho, tough it out, don't-cry values that are imposed on them.
We need to overhaul modern practices, and re-imbue things that help kids FEEL, Ground in their bodies, and Launch with emotional stability/ basic self confidence. Because that USED to be the norm. All this mental distress in the young is a new condition of humanity.
Maybe early "school" is too big a stress on later-to-develop boys? Lining up in lines, 'behaving' when they can't really do that yet? Maybe we really do need grandmothers to have enough mature modeling and lap time, to learn to regulate our very sophisticated brains?
We are FAR more nuturing to boys (kids, in general, even) than we ever have been and this is only happening now. Not before when the "tough it out" values were much more normal and widespread.
We need more men teaching boys to be men and less feminization of society. We are much too focused on feelings and emotions. I'm not saying that it should be the other extreme, but we are constantly digging into kids emotions and feelings. We need to just let kids be kids and be good role models.
That is untrue when based on 40-50 years ago. There was a big debate in the 1970s re sending 3 and 4 year olds to preschool. Now we send babies to daycare.
We are a Nation full of adults who don’t have a clue how to raise babies, toddlers and young Children so that they have a Secure attachment. We don’t even understand that secure attachments is the basis of all healthy psychological growth & it’s been purposefully hidden as far as I can tell. I went to a 4 year medical school. I did a 3 year Peds Residency in a Big Program and did 20 years of AAP approved CME.
No mention of attachment, secure base distortions, Bowlby, Main, Ainsworth. NADA. Just psyche drugs. We are giving kids psyche drugs for Attachment trauma.
The Early daycare for Infants is a Complete Disaster. So is using a screen as a Babysitter. Screens result in severe sensory deprivation/maternal deprivation & anxious, disorganized kids who are easily Propagandized.
But nothing will change by just giving Mothers time with their infants w/o teaching Psychologists, Doctors, Teachers, Parents, everyone in society about how the Brain Develops through a healthy relationship w/a Secure Base that can Mentalize/engage in reflective functioning. And children need socialization through play. (Crime Scene tape on Playgrounds precludes this. So does antisocial distancing).
We gave all these mothers of Newborns time during Covid but that study of Babies born during CV done out of Brown demonstrated that the crazy & reckless Covid Fear Porn fed to these mothers resulted in 22 point IQ drop in their babies. There is NO WAY these kids have a secure attachment after that.
The AAP put out Anticipatory guidance that basically told mothers to be freaked out about Breast Feeding their infants. My guess is babies became disorganized picking up anxious energy from a very confused & recklessly panicked mother.
So, the only way to have a Sane, Non-violent world is to make sure babies have a secure attachment.
So When are we going to talk about how to do this as a society in an open and honest way without the Corruption of Cancel Culture?
Daycare(and schools, in general) ...where they are digging into the kids heads about feelins and emotions...
Also, you said before that there is too much relying on the parent instead of the village. This contrasts with your comment here that we are sending them off to daycare...the village. So you simultaneously believe we are relying on the parent too much while also saying we rely on the village (daycare) too much.
I 100% believe that we rely on daycare too much and that kids need to be at home with their parents. While I believe that kind of nurturing is important and needs to increase BADLY, I do not agree that we need to continue this sissifying and feminization of boys. That is part of the problem.
Daycare = serial losses, low-paid strangers; same-age peers.
Village = kin, intimacy, neighbors, multi-age peers... a natural network that surrounds Mom, well known people, concording values. Village is totally different.
Why is sissifying or feminizing that I suggest?
I raised two feeling, sharing, lap-time boys and have two manly men at 25 and 31.
People need to learn how to cope with their *feelings*. It's called Emotional Self Regulation and it is the CORE of feeling a confident sense of self. It's a human skill that boys and girls both need. Boys have a harder time learning it because they have slower neurological maturation.
My sissifying comment was due to you saying boys are being robbed of nurture by "macho, tough it out" values.
Yes, you can teach kids how to cope without tinkering in their brains all day, like schools are doing with things like SEL, for instance. You can also teach coping without babying and feminizing them. We did it throughout all of life before now.
A secure attachment for Boys results in Compassionate & Empathic Men.
The “SEL” being done in Schools - Is Manipulation being done by People who don’t know anything about Child Development.
These people could supervise Play making sure no anxious preoccupied or avoidant/disorganized kid gets bullied or becomes overly aggressive to a Peer but doing the “Privilege” walks etc is Pure Manipulation.
I did all my work with poor Rural White Boys. They are Doing just as Poorly as Inner city Black Kids.
Even Alicia Lieberman put out a paper that shows that Race and Poverty isn’t the deciding factor. So did Stephen Soumi and James Heckman.
The difference is the quality of Maternal Attachment aka Maternal Care.
Yes, Prescott looked at the anthropological studies in tribes showing that a permissive sexual attitude in adolescence provides the last 20 percent of variance in violent societies. Okay, let’s look at that. BUT what is being done in school (by people who in my mind are engaging in incredibly unethical behavior such as keeping secrets from parents, cross dressing kids, keeping a separate medical record) IS NOT what he was referring to.
Messages are being given to white kids that are not at all subtle that scream, “You are a Bad Person for Being White & Male. You are NO GOOD as you are.”
This is absolutely NOT APPROPRIATE! There are kids coming to school from families riddled with Violence and Abuse only to be Abused even more by adults with an Abusive, Manipulative, Malevolent Agenda. This is not what school is for.
I want a non-violent society. This is achieved by providing a secure attachment with safety & love to all children.
I agree. We don’t have this so called “Toxic Masculinity” anymore. We tell boys they are Vile for being born Male and White & the only way to escape that is to become Trans. This is pure, vicious propaganda.
The other problem is Early Daycare & Screens.
The early daycare leads to insecure attachments (avoidant which leads to narcissism and schizoid - looks like & may even be pretty much the same as autism. It’s certainly the same Phenotypically). The Screens solidify the attachment with something non-human & this precludes social play which is necessary for child socialization. All work w/infants and animal research show that Screens can’t activate Mirror Neurons and the origins of Empathy is Neonatal Imitation through Mirror Neurons.
We are being Purposefully guided by Social Science Research into a Trans Funnel - first transsexual; eventually transhumanism. It’s purposeful.
I was on my State’s Developmental Behavioral Pediatrics Committee. When Covid Happened - it was clear, the panic and obscene reckless paranoia over a Virus less dangerous to kids than Flu was causing serious problems. Autistic Kids were killing themselves.
The only Kid I knew who died of Covid actually died in early May 2020 at 15 years old from the Non-pharmaceutical Interventions (NPIs). The Masking & “Lockdowns” led this 15 y/o autistic male to Hang himself.
I tried to talk to my DB group. They didn’t care and I was basically cancelled. The head of the committee still goes on Podcasts saying that the rate of Trans-Kids is increasing because now society is being forced to approve. She was the President of My State AAP. The entire thing is ludricious.
It’s ALL BOGUS. We are taking traumatized & confused kids and Abusing them in Hideous ways.
Cross-sex Hormones and Sex Change Operations don’t treat Childhood attachment Trauma.
I agree with you about walking the Coast. I’d have them out walking the Appalachian Trial & we would Camp in the Mountains. We’d pick apples and figure out how to collect edible mushrooms. We would read books on how to create a Food Forest.
And I would smash every screen with a Hammer. There’s a reason that Logo is of an Apple with a Bite out of it
Exactly. No wonder boys want to be girls when they're told they're ghastly by media, schools (the state), Hollywood, etc. and they're overly feminized. They're not taught to be boys any longer. Far too many have no fathers and have no male role models to model manhood. Too many are overly protected and babied by mothers. Etc etc.
And all kids are having their brains tinkered with and having them dwell on their feelings and emotions constantly.
Thank you for all your commitment in putting this together.
Has there been anything similar conducted for girls?
I am getting more and more concerned about this notion of "giftedness". What again is the definition of this? Most kids are clever, and parents generally feel that their child is clever. But what evidence that these kids are more than normally clever?
To be technically considered gifted, you need an assessment by an educational psychologist or get certain scores on certain tests.
It is a complicated issue, for sure. I personally don't have much respect for the IQ tests but I did test my daughter when she was 4. I did it just to get her into a nice school, as did tons of other parents where I live. She passed the test as did so many other kids from the "educated" families. Especially at a young age , the test pretty much just identified involved educated families where kids are read to. So, I never really thought much of it, I just used the test for a utilitarian purpose. I saw the kids in her "gifted" school and they were just regular kids with only a few clearly gifted. I do think the gifted label is a bit of a burden psychologically for the kids so maybe there is something there, the burden of the label and feeling like you can't live up to it? On the other hand, when I read detransitoners I am constantly in awe at how eloquent and intelligent they are so it is possible that the connection with giftedness is real. In which case I wonder if the gifted kids are victims of envy from their peers. (And then there is autism connection of course).
Common definition of "gifted" is IQ over 130 = top 2-3 percent = 2+ standard deviations, as measured by a test like OLSAT, NNAT, or WISC. Smart kids but not super-smart.
What surprises me about this study is the super-smarts. They report that kids with a one-in-a-thousand IQ form 41% of ROGD boys. THREE HUNDRED TIMES elevated rate. Even if the parents exaggerate, it's still high. And it supports the idea that male ROGD is a disease of the high-IQ.
I wonder if it partly is due to the fact that these kids are in many cases not physically active, and do mostly stuff involving computers and books. I was 'gifted' and did mostly non-athletic stuff.
I think it may be a combination of the fact that intellectually "gifted"/very bright kids live in their heads more and are thus more susceptible to mind bugs (which Gender Ideology is) and that they feel extra social isolation if they do not have many intellectual peers with whom they can connect. Hey, maybe some of these gifted kids are transing in order to connect with other gifted kids and have a peer group (which is very important when you become a teen)?
I'm not sure how you are defining clever, but IQ tests can ID kids who are above average. The more deviations above average, the more gifted. Spatial and working memory are just a couple of subsets on the tests. Anecdotally, in parent groups we talk about how smart/gifted our kids are and wonder how/why they are getting captured. Many have had some type of formal test.
I agree. Lol
There are different tests that can be given to meet the criteria of gifted and talented. G&T has never been about promoting academics though. Those kids have always been targeted as lab rats to become leaders in progressive ideologies.
If you have a gifted child, you know it.
I understand what you mean, and people may be gifted in different areas. This survey asked parents if their son had cognitive (IQ) testing and what the approximate score was. Of course, while these boys may be academically gifted, it shows majority struggle socially.
That's an interesting point about different areas. Especially at high levels, kids show a lot of unevenness (Billy is >99.9% at math but 50% at spelling, etc.)
I wonder if anyone has more granular data about sub-intelligences. Like "ROGD tracks with verbal but not quantitative"
I still want a study of Big Five Personality Traits and ROGD. That just might explain the girls.
https://pitt.substack.com/p/why-is-this-happening-to-my-family
I think gifted and socially ALK ward often go hand in hand though.