Is chess still mostly played by educated or clever people?

I always thought that chess was a high intellect activity, however, reading the some comments,, trolls, scammers... especially in the daily puzzle, I now have serious doubts...

What is your opinion? is chess still mostly played by educated or clever people?

It has little to do with being smart or educated. Everyone can become good at it.

maybe although there is a strong correlation between high IQ and GM worldwide... isn't it?

@JailhouseTaught

Some of us are Drunken idiots.

wouldn't say so anymore

I thought it was generally played by lazy day dreamers who fantasize about being a great field marshal and tactician but without all the bloodshed and danger.

Generally yes in my experience. All the club chess players I know are educated, so they have a degree, and do relatively well. They are small businessmen or corporate employees. I don´t know any club player who is poor or has a mean job.

Not neccesarily. While Magnus Carlsen has a genius IQ (190) Hikaru Nakamura has an average IQ (100-110) and is the number 2 player in the world.

Intelligence plays some role but is not the only factor that is related to chess ability. Chess also requires visual-spatial ability, concentration, memory, emotional control, competitiveness, and motivation to play and learn. Someone may show these other traits and become a strong chess player even if they don’t score well on an IQ test.

in my chess career, I have known chess players who are doctors, lawyers, mathematicians, psychologists, computer scientists, and members of other professions. However, I have also known chess players who drive cabs, drive trucks, work in construction, are dock workers, and so on. I once knew a chess player who ran an adult book store.

chessplayers shouldn’t fool themselves into thinking that they are smart because they play chess. I know several people who would say that wasting so much time on a game is a sign that a person is not very smart.

Chess is no longer limited to a niche group of educated or intellectually inclined individuals. While many clever and educated people do play chess, the game now appeals to a much broader and more diverse audience.

You don't have to be educated to be clever. I'd say that by definition, good chess players are clever. They may not be at all well educated.

yes , Clever or high IQ is better than being educated. Bobby didn't study but had a high IQ of 180 to beat the Russian armada, while alone.

Best player ever.

He did the impossible.

Major break through

See below, IQ and ELO for top 10 players

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/8VqhMVLpmMQ

I bet that all the IQ scores in that table are completely made up.

The table above comes from comes from www.chessmadeeasy.com

not at all, and even if a superior IQ where required for the highest chess levels, this is strongly mitigated by the facts most super GM's have few interests outside chess and many actually skip formal education all together to focus on the game

there has been a few a GM with ph.ds however. Lasker was a mathematician. Jonathan Mestel is a brilliant mathematician and Kenneth Rogoff is a harvard economist. Then there is John Nunn , who was also a mathematician. Carlsen actually said this of Nunn
"I am convinced that the reason the Englishman John Nunn never became world champion is that he is too clever for that. ... He has so incredibly much in his head. Simply too much. His enormous powers of understanding and his constant thirst for knowledge distracted him from chess."

As a psychologist (now retired), let me say that online tests are not valid. They should not be used for making any meaningful decisions, such as diagnosing or assigning people to special educational programs. So, I suspect that most of the figures in the table are either estimates or from invalid sources.

For the most part.

FYI, these numbers that you found are simply fictionalized- made by someone who likely doesn't understand the purpose of IQ tests.

Laypersons believe that IQ score is a measurement of how "smart" a person is (as if the entirety of human intellect could be distilled into a single number).

That isn't really what IQ tests are meant for. They're designed to measure how well a participant may do in the academic system, and/or to help diagnose or identify those with particular intellectual or developmental needs ...