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Being lazy could mean you're highly intelligent

If you would rather read laze about than play football, research suggests this might mean you have a higher IQ than those more active.

 

Well, new research suggests this could mean you are smarter than your active counterparts.

Research published in the Journal of Health Psychology suggests that smart people spend more time lazing around than those who are active.

The researchers at Florida Gulf Coast University found that people with a high IQ don't bore easily, leading them to spend more time being still and engaged in thought.

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Their report, titled 'The physical sacrifice of thinking: Investigating the relationship between thinking and physical activity in everyday life' noted the researchers examined whether the trait of “need for cognition” was associated with daily physical activity levels.

The study suggested active people may need to be more physical in order to stimulate their minds with external activities.

The researchers, led by Todd McElroy, gave an online test of "Need For Cognition" to lots of students, to find 30 who expressed a particularly strong desire to think a lot and 30 others with a strong preference to avoid anything too mentally taxing.

Participants were asked how strongly they agree with questions 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 30 thinkers and 30 non-thinkers then wore an accelerometer on their wrist for seven days, to provide a constant measure of how physically active they were during that time, The British Psychological Society reported.

The "thinking" group were "far less active" during the week than the "non-thinking" group, but on weekends, results showed that there was no significant difference in the activity rates for both groups, something which researchers were unable to explain.

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Regardless of IQ levels, McElroy encourages everyone to try to lead a more active lifestyle in order to improve overall health.

"Awareness of their tendency to be less active, coupled with an awareness of the cost associated with inactivity, more thoughtful people may then choose to become more active throughout the day," he told The British Psychological Society.

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