How to increase IQ at home

IQ tests are a specially selected set of standardized tasks that measure a person’s mental abilities and their overall intellectual profile. This scientifically based assessment of intelligence is used:

• during a medical examination to determine the mental norm and pathology;
• in professional selection to assess professional suitability or unsuitability;
• to measure school achievement;
• when assessing academic ability.

The greater the level of your personal and professional claims is, the more important it is for you to get high IQ. High IQ is not only the reason to be proud, but also a way to win in the competition for prestigious positions and positions in successful high-tech companies.

IQ tests consist of two parts:

- tests assessing verbal intelligence (e.g. general awareness, vocabulary),

- tests assessing non-verbal intelligence (for example, the ability to find patterns, operate with spatial images).

Scientists do not hide the fact that many features of our mind are hereditary or innate (by the way, these are different things). But then they say that numerous experiments have confirmed the greatest flexibility of the brain and its almost unlimited ability to learn. This is not surprising when it comes to the development of verbal (verbal) intelligence. For example, you can successfully solve the problem of how to increase the IQ of a teenager, if you help him to actively develop his speech and vocabulary, learning new concepts and categories.

And how to increase the level of IQ in an adult? If he is confident enough in speaking and able to express his thoughts accurately?

One of the ways to increase IQ in this case may be the development of non-verbal intelligence.

Trainings against blindness to change

No one disputes the fact that our brain knows a lot more than we do. For example, our vision is able to see what we are not aware of.

This is proved by simple exercises like “find 6 differences in these pictures”. Having a look at the pictures, we most likely would not have noticed these differences if we were not aware of them. Especially when such a task is designed not for children, but for adults. We will have to work hard to find and realize what our brain has already seen, but did not bother to tell us about. This feature of the brain neuropsychologists call "blindness to change."

Non-verbal tests evaluate, among other things, this connection between “vision” and “recognition”. In other words, they measure observance, the ability to distinguish essential details, to identify the missing detail or to identify a discrepancy.

The basic tasks that need to be done in this part of the IQ test are:

• search for patterns,
• synthesis of the whole from separate parts,
• search for patterns and continuation of a number of characters.

Not just to watch, but to see!

Do you see two colliding cars? Do not limit yourself to a phrase like "Bad luck!" Try to observe the whole picture of the accident and see its causes. Maybe there was ice on the road, or there was a dog in one of the cars that prevented the driver, or something else.

Every time, facing a situation where the overall picture is not obvious, show all your observation in order to restore in your mind all the elements that have fallen out of your sight.

Break patterns of your behavior!

When deciding how to increase brain IQ, take a close look at your habits and try to change them.

For example,

• Whenever time permits, write with your left hand if you are right handed, and with the right one if you are left handed. It will slow down your work, but it will be a great workout for your brain!

• Change your usual routes, for example, from home to work or to the supermarket trading area, where you make weekly purchases.

• From time to time rearrange the furniture in the apartment or office.

Our brain is in some sense similar to a kaleidoscope: changes in familiar pictures shake it and induce to change the familiar picture of the surrounding world. At the same time, new neural connections are created in the brain, while the routine and everything that you habitually do automatically, immerse the brain in a lazy comfort zone.

Difficult reading for the brain

Strangely enough, but reading technical instructions with an understanding of the steps described in them is a very good simulator for those who are thinking about how to increase IQ at home. Of course, if it is not a primitive instruction, which contains only trivial reminders about compliance with safety regulations.

It is useful to read complex literature, especially that which is not related to your usual background, for example, on architecture, if you are not an architect, or music, if you are not a musician. And books on physics and mathematics, even written in a popular language, are an unsurpassed vitamin for the brain.

Reading in a foreign language is also an effective development tool

Despite the fact that we are talking about reading, all the exercises listed here contribute to the training of non-verbal intelligence, primarily because they force the brain to generate new pictures that are unusual for it - images and ideas.

The main rule here: the level of complexity should be, so to say, “through the roof”, it means, require you to work hard at the limit of your mental capabilities.

Good news for fans of video games

Scientists unanimously agreed that computer games can be a great way to stimulate the brain. The games that require:

• problem solving in a situation of uncertainty (incomplete data),
• choice of several options with no obvious differences,
• quick decision making,
• developing and following a specific strategy

You should choose not those games that you like and that correspond to your intellectual preferences, but those that make you think differently and think faster than you used to do it in everyday life.

Scientific research on ways to increase human IQ showed that even popular games like Tetris already contribute to more efficient brain activity.

It was established experimentally that as players gain successful computer game experience, their brains require less and less glucose. Such a decrease in the “energy fuel” consumed shows that as a result of the training, the work of the brain has become less energy-intensive, i.e. the brain became easier to cope with the mental activity that at the beginning of the experiment required elevated doses of glucose.

To increase the learning and development effect of a computer game, scientists propose:

• imagine that you are actually in a situation recreated in a game,

• sincerely worry about your losses and be happy to win,

• having finished the game, mentally evaluate all the particularly successful and weak points,

• think through what you would do in a different way if you had to play this game again.

Old proven methods

Do not forget about reliable and well-proven ways of development. They will serve as a completely reliable answer to the question of how to increase IQ in an adult and a child. So, we should include in the number of simulators for the brain such familiar trainings as:

• chess,
• Rubik's Cube,
• puzzles
• Board games.

Here the same rule of maximum complexity is preserved. Easy tasks "corrupt" the brain, allow it to be lazy, and you create the illusion of intellectual victories.

Become open to new experiences

Exploring new horizons is not the easiest and not the most pleasant task. Therefore, such a quality as “openness to new experience” is the basis of a strong, ambitious and, as a rule, successful person.

Indeed, how ready are you to try, say, such an exotic dish as snake tails? What about jumping with a bungee? Or go to visit people who speak the language you do not know, and then try to understand them and talk to them?

New impressions actively nourish the brain. Everything that surprises the brain and makes it “change the image in a kaleidoscope” is useful for its development:

• unusual activities

• new views,

• unusual smells and sounds,

• difficult reproducible actions and operations.

Measure your progress

The practice of regularly evaluating your intellectual level using intelligence tests deserves the highest praise. However, it is equally important to track your progress. How much has your IQ changed over the last year? And over the past six months?

If you have mastered puzzles from one pack of tests, go to another. Moreover, you have a large choice, and you can always find an opportunity to pass intelligence tests:

• Wexler,

• Amthauer,

• Cattell,

• Matrix Ravena.