Being smart can help someone get ahead in life, in both a professional and personal capacity. An intelligent person can command respect in the workplace and in their social circles, making it a highly valued personality trait.
But some people aren’t as smart as they’d like to believe, and there are distinct indications that prove as much.
Here are 9 signs someone is not intelligent, even though they pretend to be
1. They talk more than they listen
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Someone who pretends to be smart will try to be the star of whatever conversation they’re in, rather than acknowledge that a successful interaction requires stepping back and staying quiet.
One 2020 study on communication defined listening as “The selfless act of being with another, which has powerful influences on health and well-being.” It’s highly likely that a person who talks more than they listen is insecure about their actual level of intelligence, so they try to seem smart by babbling on and on.
In reality, intelligent people tend to listen more readily than less intelligent people, as psychotherapist Jenny Maenpaa pointed out. “Active listening is when someone can listen to you at length, truly taking in what you’re saying, and not interrupt,” she explained.
A person who pretends to be smart probably isn’t skilled at active listening, because all they want to do is commandeer conversations in order to inflate their own ego.
2. They brag a lot
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Another sign that someone isn’t as intelligent as they pretend to be is bragging, which is also related to being insecure. A person who tells you how smart they are is probably less intelligent than they pretend to be.
According to research from the University of Arizona, bragging about your abilities makes people think you’re less trustworthy. Bragging is connected to the idea of “impression management,” which posits that people brag about themselves in order to appear more capable.
Yet University of Arizona professor Martin Reimann, who is also the study’s author, found that resorting to bragging often backfired. “If you consider yourself a highly capable individual… Dial it down a notch in presenting yourself to others or managing impressions about what you can do,” Reimann said.
A truly intelligent person doesn’t need to prove how smart they are, while someone who wants other people to think they’re smart does.Â
3. They’re not self-aware
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A major indication of a person’s intelligence depends on how self-aware they are. Someone who has a solid understanding of who they are and what drives them likely got to that mental place by engaging in self-reflection. Yet someone who isn’t as smart as they say they are probably doesn’t know themselves very well.
A 2016 psychology study that measured the effects of self-awareness on people’s well-being defined self-awareness as “A conscious awareness of one’s internal states and interactions with others.” The study found that self-reflection and insight were key aspects of the positive effects of being self-aware.
An intelligent person looks inward often. They question their own patterns of behavior and seek to improve how they show up for themselves and for others.
A person who is less intelligent than they pretend to be avoids excavating their internal world, because they don’t have the intellectual capacity to do so. As a result, they don’t fully understand themselves beyond their surface level wants and needs.
4. They lack curiosity
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A truly intelligent person is always exploring new ideas, but a person who pretends to be intelligent doesn’t actually challenge themselves.
A pretender knows highly specific facts or pieces of trivia that they share with others in an attempt to seem knowledgeable, but they don’t dive any deeper than what they already know.
They’re not naturally curious people, so they don’t try to teach themselves any new information. They’re stuck in their own familiar ways and don’t push themselves beyond their limited boundaries.Â
5. They don’t admit when they’re wrong
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A sign of high intelligence is being able to say that you don’t know the answer, whereas a person pretending to be intelligent is too prideful to admit when they’re wrong.
A 2019 psychology study examined the concept of intellectual humility, which the researchers defined as an “Awareness of one’s intellectual fallibility.” Therefore, intellectually humble people “understand and accept that their cognitive faculties are not perfect and that their viewpoints may, at times, be erroneous.”
In other words, smart people know what they don’t know.
Psychologist and lead researcher Elizabeth J. Krumrei-Mancuso explained that “intellectual humility was associated with more accurate assessment of one’s general knowledge. That is, knowing (and being willing to admit!) what you don’t know may be the first step to seeking new knowledge.”
A person pretending to be smart will likely exhibit less intellectual humility than a highly intelligent person, and therefore, won’t admit their mistakes or change their beliefs.Â
6. They seek outside validation
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As Judith Pearson, a licensed counselor, explained, relying on other people’s praise and compliments as a measure of your self-worth is a sign that someone is an external validator.
Someone who validates their actions from the inside relies on their own internal compass as a judge, rather than looking for other people’s approval.
A person who pretends to be intelligent needs a steady stream of outside validation, because they’re not actually basing their sense of self-worth on their own values, but rather, on how they’re perceived by others.
7. They’re competitive
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Just as a truly intelligent person practices having intellectual humility, they also work toward being accepting and affirming of other people, rather than competitive.
A person who compares themselves to others in a negative way makes it very clear that they’re only pretending to be intelligent, as they’re not actually secure in who they are. They’ll ask what grade you got on an academic assignment or demand to know what your boss said during a one-on-one, all because they want to reassure themselves that they’re better than you.
8. They’re superficial
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Another sign that someone isn’t as smart as they want you to believe is that they thrive on superficiality.
They care more about optics than building solid foundations in relationships. They hold onto rigid standards of being “good” or “bad,” and judge anyone who strays from the norm.
Pretending to be more intelligent than they really are is a way for them to boost their sense of self-esteem, even though they based their self-esteem around shallow ideals in the first place.
9. They push down their emotions
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Not allowing space for their own feelings is an indication that someone has low emotional intelligence. While a smart person knows that it’s okay to have a wide range of emotions, a person pretending to be smart thinks that they have to be perfect all the time, and therefore, they refuse to reveal or explore how they feel.
Psychologist Nick Wignall explained that emotionally unintelligent people often mask their emotions with complicated language, noting they “​​intellectualize their emotions, using abstract and conceptual language to avoid describing how they really feel.” In contrast, Wignall shared that “People with high emotional intelligence aren’t afraid to describe their feelings with plain emotional language.”
Because a person who pretends to be smart struggles to express how they feel, they tend to talk in circles about emotional topics. A marker of true intelligence is a willingness to be open to all emotions, even the ones that are painful or hard to explain.
Alexandra Blogier is a writer on YourTango’s news and entertainment team. She covers social issues, pop culture analysis and all things to do with the entertainment industry.
