Types of intelligence

Everyone knows it: the intelligence test or IQ test. You do the test, which is quite complicated, however, and then you get a score: The Intelligence Quotient or IQ. An IQ of 100 is an average score, so if your score is more than 100, you are more intelligent than average, and 125 is already a very good result. If your score is below 100, you are less intelligent than average and an IQ of 80 is already quite low. Simple, isn’t it? Everybody a score and we know his or her abilities. Really? Psychologists knew already that it’s not that simple. For example, what exactly is intelligence? Isn’t it culture-dependent? Isn’t intelligence a multiple concept? The developmental psychologist Howard Gardner was the first to find out that there is no intelligence as such, but that there are several types of intelligence, and that you can be more intelligent in one way and less in another respect. Every combination of intelligence types is possible and so are your abilities. You can be a good reasoner but a bad mathematician. You can be a very good carpenter but cannot explain what you are exactly doing. It’s wrong to identify intelligence with mathematical cognitive capabilities, as always had been done. Each type of intelligence has a value of its own.

Gardner distinguished first seven and then eight types of intelligence, and maybe there is a ninth type as well. Here they are (for more extensive descriptions, see Sources below):

Bodily-Kinaesthetic Intelligence
Characteristics: Good body and mind coordination; good sense of timing; good fine and gross motor skills.
Examples: Athletes, dancers, soldiers, builders, and doctors.

Interpersonal Intelligence
Characteristics: High degree of interpersonal intelligence; good at interacting with other persons. Easily understanding people and social situations. Easily picking up personal and social signals and good at going along with people and in social situations and at adapting to them. Enjoying cooperation with others and discussions.
Examples: Teachers, psychologists, social workers, politicians, salespersons.

Intrapersonal Intelligence
Characteristics: Ability to understand oneself; being aware of own’s feelings, thoughts and emotions, and understanding why one has them. Good at predicting one’s reactions in different situations. So one knows one weaknesses and strengths, which helps to make plans and achieve goals.
Examples: psychologists, writers, therapists, counsellors, social workers, theologians, entrepreneurs, poets.

Linguistic Intelligence
Characteristics: Ability to use words effectively; to use the right words and to express well what you mean. This can but does not need not include the ability easily to learn another language.
Examples: Writers, journalists, lawyers, public speakers, TV hosts.

Logical-Mathematical Intelligence
Characteristics: Good in cognitive skills such as critical, logical and abstract thinking, reasoning, problem-solving skills; the ability to understand and express systems and elements through numbers.
Examples: Mathematicians, logicians, economists, accountant, scientist, computer analysts.

Musical Intelligence
Characteristics: Sensitive to sounds, rhythms, tones, melodies, timbres, and pitches. Can easily memorize tunes and rhythms and detect subtle noises and sounds that others may not even be able to hear.
Examples: Singer, musicians, composers, music teachers, conductors, dancers.

Visual-Spatial Intelligence
Characteristics: Capacity to think in spatial relations and images and consider things in three dimensions; ability to mentally move and shift 3D images and to perceive different perspectives.
Examples; Architects, designers, photographers, cartographers, pilots.

Naturalist Intelligence (originally not included by Gardner in his typology)
Characteristics: Sensitivity to the environment and changes in nature.
Examples: Farmers, gardeners, hunters, biological scientists, astronomers, meteorologists, geologists, landscape architects.

Existential Intelligence (Gardner’s possible ninth type)
Characteristics: Ability to handle deep questions such as the meaning of existence; being highly sensitive on matters related to human existence; being comfortable talking about serious questions and also striving to find answers.
Examples: Writers, theologians, philosophers, economists, bloggers.

Actually, we knew already from practice that there are people who are cognitively intelligent and people who are practically intelligent: There are thinkers and doers. As Gardner’s investigations have made clear, the situation is more complicated. “Intelligence” is a multifaceted, multiple and multidimensional concept. In fact, there are no smart people and stupid people. Everyone is good at one thing and less good at something else and maybe very bad at a third thing. But because intelligence has many variations, we are usually good at at least one thing.
Do you want to know what your strong and weak points are? There are several tests on the internet that measure your multiple intelligence, for example here and here. Such a test is an easy way to find out your intelligence type, unless you are intrapersonal-intelligent, for, of course, then you should know it already.

Sources
- Howard Gardner, Frames of the Mind: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences. New York: Basic Books, 1983. Free download here.
- “The 8 Types of intelligence”
- Nord Anglia, “What are the nine types of intelligence that should be considered in all school curricula?”