Well, and people who trust online results are just laughable– many of those tests, if I were to guess, intentionally give people higher results so that they will feel good about the test they took and about that website and so they keep coming back to it (any of the major quiz sites that people like to use– tickle.com is the first one that comes to my mind). In any case, they give completely inaccurate results for any real purpose and are just for fun–which you already know– but people don’t seem to realize that!

But, that said, my IQ score on some of those tests (I’ve gotten anywhere from 135 to 153 on different online tests, lol) correlates pretty well with my SAT score (2270: 800 critical reading, 690 math [should have studied more], and 780 writing). I wish I could find a chart specifically for the NEW SAT, though. Because when I took the old SAT (one of the last times it was even offered) I was barely 15 and hadn’t even been through all of Geometry or Algebra 2– 710 verbal, 550 math the first time (freshman in high school); 690 verbal, 650 math the second time (sophomore). Here are a few other converters: http://www.davidpbrown.co.uk/psychology/iq-conversion.html , http://www.assessmentpsychology.com/iq.htm . I like that last one because it separates the SAT verbal from the combined score… because, like anyone and everyone, I want to think my IQ is higher than it really is and I can pretend either that my critical reading score on the new one is the same as the old verbal section, or that by the time I was 18 and took the SAT for the last time my score on the verbal would have been higher. But there I can also use my ACT score– 35–to look at IQ, which does look nice for me… however, if I use this ACT/SAT (math+verbal) comparison from College Board (and they would know, right?) http://www.collegeboard.com/research/pdf/concordance_between_s_10502.pdf that makes it even higher, by your chart or the other ones… so, yeah: I just really want to think that my IQ is higher than it really is. Who doesn’t?

I’d say that most of the people who claim high IQs online aren’t quite lying, but rather are using wishful thinking as the source of their purported IQs, as well as untrustworthy online results and a desire to look smarter…

I could take it twenty times and take the best score, which could be a 150 if I decided to narrow things down and “find” the right answer for a question I had no clue about.

As for the people who “overestimate” their IQ…I don’t see the point. Come on! An 11 year-old getting an IQ of 134? Who is to say he didn’t sit at the computer for hours randomly choosing answers?

IQ testing is a complex thing, and the tests get re-normed regularly, so that a 110 this year, right before the test gets re-normed, is a 105 or 100 next year.

IQ score, especially on Internet tests, is really related to family income (as is SAT and many other achievement scores – you get more experiences you get better scores – if you have more money you get more experiences . . . ) as much as anything.

A real IQ test is an expensive and interesting thing, and psychologists will often only tell you a range score, like ‘moderately high’ or some such.

If they really got those scores through valid means, they would not have to ask if their scores are good because a psychologist would have explained what their results mean.