According to a new study, people who are lazy spend more time engaged in thought, leading them to be more intelligent than their active counterparts. The study was conducted by researchers at the Florida Gulf Coast University in the US. The findings were published in the Journal of Health Psychology.
Say the researchers, Active people are more physical as they need to refresh their minds with external activities, either to escape their thoughts or because they get bored easily. People with a high intelligent quotient, or IQ, get bored less easily, leading them to spend more time engaged in though.
Researchers gave a classic test - which dates back three decades - to a group of students. The need for cognition questionnaire asked students to rate how strongly they agree with statements like I really enjoy a task that involves coming up with new solutions to problems, and I only think as hard as I have to.
The researchers selected 30 thinkers and as many non-thinkers. For the next one week, both groups wore a device on their wrist which tracked their movements and activity levels, giving a constant stream of data on how physically active they were.
Speaking about this, they said, The results showed that the thinking group were far less active during the week than the non-thinkers. The findings are highly significant and robust in statistical terms. Non-thinkers get bored more easily, so they need to fill their time with physical activity. However, we suggest that less active people, no matter how intelligent they are, should aim to raise their overall activity levels to improve their health.