The world’s shortest IQ test won’t demand much of your time, and if you ace it, you might just earn the title of a certified genius.
TikToker @chibimallo shared the IQ test, created by MIT professor Shane Frederick, known as the Cognitive Reflection Test.
With just three questions, it’s a quick test you can breeze through.
It’s touted as ‘the fastest IQ test on Earth,’ and if you answer all questions correctly, you’re deemed ‘smarter than 80 percent of humanity.’
Psychologist Frederick conducted this test on 3,428 people over 26 months. Only 17 percent of them answered all three questions correctly, while 33 percent got all three wrong. So, it’s safe to say this is no walk in the park. Think you can tackle it?
Here are the questions:
- A bat and a ball cost $1.10 in total, with the bat costing $1 more than the ball. How much does the ball cost?
- If it takes five machines five minutes to make five widgets, how long would it take 100 machines to make 100 widgets?
- In a lake, there’s a patch of lily pads. Each day, the patch doubles in size. If it takes 48 days for the patch to cover the entire lake, how long would it take for the patch to cover half of the lake?
Before you rush to submit your Mensa application, remember that getting these questions wrong doesn’t equate to being unintelligent. IQ tests are just one measure of cognitive abilities.
These questions are designed to provoke ‘impulsive erroneous responses,’ where your brain jumps to an answer that seems right initially but isn’t on closer inspection.
Now, for the answers:
- The ball costs five cents, making the bat $1.05, and together, they total $1.10.
- The correct answer is five minutes. If five machines make five widgets in five minutes, one machine makes a widget in five minutes. So, 100 machines working simultaneously can make 100 widgets in five minutes.
- The patch of lily pads, doubling in size each day, covers half of the lake on day 47, not 24 days.
Did you get them all right? If so, congratulations—you’re smart! So well done for that.
