I think I made a mistake
my friend and i were arguing about whos smarter and i joked that we should take an iq test together. i really didnt think much of it because i dont consider her to be unintelligent and thought it would be interesting to see where we would rank against each other-
i got the 98th percentile and she got the 28th and i feel awful because now she thinks shes dumb and i dont know what to say or do. i really didnt think her score would be that low
i was expecting us both to get around 70-80th percentile or something and we could just forget about it tomorrow but such a drastic difference really seems to have brought down her self esteem and i feel like its all my fault
shes my best friend and i promised her i wouldnt tell any of our other friends so this was the only place i could think to talk about this
i tried to say some encouraging things and highlighted all of the fields where she excels. i really just want her to know that whatever number some dumb website gave her shouldnt mean anything :(
i genuinely feel like an awful friend for even putting her in this situation and making her feel bad about herself at all
i dont know what else to do i dont want our friendship to change because of this dumb mistake
@cadenssocks hey don't be hard on yourself. You only made a fun suggestion, you weren't to know the outcome of it. It seems like you've done your best to build up her self esteem again, this is not your fault ❤ perhaps it would help to have a fun day together, and try to put this behind you both ❤ good luck sweetie ❤ gives you a giant tiny hug
@cadenssocks Am not sure what advice to give you re your friend's disappointment after the online "test"... Here is something you should know: currently, the most reliable (or widely accepted by the current scientific consensus) tests are the Wechsler Adult Intel. Test & the Stanford-Binet. There are other kinds of tests but none of them are considered as having as much validity overall as the two listed here. Also, most of the online tests are bulls***. Real intelligence tests are taken under a time limit &, even now, involve a lot of filling circles in on a form that can be easily checked by a test administrator. Most likely, the online test you & your friend took does not measure much of anything.
You could point out to your friend that intelligence is not a full measure of human worth by itself. Sure, it can be great to have, but other important parts of being human are morality & compassion. You can be a brainiac but if you have no conscience, you're still a sociopath, albeit an intelligent one. Iosif Stalin was a brilliant man, but not too many people outside certain Communist circles would describe Stalin as a shining example of human excellence.