Experts Say Brilliant Children Can Later Fall Into an Underachieving Emotional Trap
She is barely out of diapers, but the world already knows 2-year-old Karina Oakley is a genius. Her mother, Charlotte Fraser, revealed to the British media Tuesday that a London-based intelligence researcher estimated her young daughter’s IQ around 160.
This March, America learned it had its own genius child. Six-year-old Pranav Veera of Ohio made the media rounds after he scored 176 on an IQ test.
Although millions of us celebrate these children’s brilliance on TV shows that air past their bedtime, childhood development experts debate whether Pranav and Karina should ever have been told.
“We don’t usually tell children what their IQ scores are,” said Sylvia Rimm, a child psychologist and author of “Why Bright Kids Get Poor Grades, and What You Can Do About It.”
“The overemphasis on how brilliant they are often leaves them with a pressured existence trying to living up to their potential,” she said.
By LAUREN COX
ABC News Medical Unit
Abc News
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