Depends on what you mean by “low.” At a certain level low enough IQ is associated with intellectual disability, and a difficulty functioning in society. IQ is normalized so half of people have, by definition, an IQ lower than 100, and half have an IQ above 100. 15 points is a standard deviation, so about 68% of people fall between 85 and 115, and the remaining 32% fall within the “tails”. I assume by “Low IQ” you would mean the ~16% of the population below 85 IQ, and probably the ~13.5% that fall in the range of 70-85, as below 70 is getting into intellectual disability territory.

Statistically, people in this band do worse in just about every metric for social success. Lower income, higher crime rates, higher rates of drug addiction, poorer health outcomes, etc. However, it is difficult to disentangle these impacts from poverty. Populations’ IQs raise when they become less poor, and people regardless of income tend to be less poor if they have higher IQs. The cycle of poverty is deeply intertwined with IQ, and poverty causes a lot of the social issues associated with low IQ. There is a lot of evidence that as access to education and a more “intellectually rich” upbringing increase IQ, and such things are less available to poor people for a variety of reasons.

As for what it’s like, from my understanding speaking to people I suspect are in this band the main things are a non-inquisitive world view, a sense of resignation around not understanding abstract concepts, and low self esteem associated with these perceived shortcomings. Society does not treat these people kindly as a whole, and I think that we could all stand to be kinder to one another. I also think that our economic system is geared in such a way that not only are low IQ people punished for that, but they are also made to feel that it is a personal shortcoming even though these things are defined statistically such that there is always a group of people at the bottom who are going to be left behind.

I’m not stupid stupid, but I’m a lot less intelligent now than I was as a child. Not sure if that’s standard growing-up stuff or other factors. I think I’m average now, but I used to be really quite smart.

Whatevers to blame, it sucks. I struggle to remember names of people/things/processes, or things to do today. I go through the day based on vibes. I look at a page of information, or a tedious form to fill in, and it’s physically uncomfortable to slog through it. I can feel my brain groaning, there’s tension and anxiety in my body. Frustration that this should be so easy and instead I’m having to actually concentrate.

It’s great! You always have full confidence in yourself, your actions and your convictions.

They will never get past the join lemmy page when it starts talking about federation. So there is no point asking that here.

Long Covid with ME has made me increasingly dumber. It sucks bad. I have difficulty finding words, following conversations, understanding long texts and just plain remembering things. It’s devastating to be more stupid but knowing that you could do better.

Just a few minutes ago I said I couldn’t play Leisure Suit Larry 7 because it’s too hard. Sucks ass.

if you believe in IQ tests you’re already an expert

if it gets low enough that you dont understand how bad off you are, its apparently not that bad.

Ask Trump?

What do you mean with “IQ”?

You get to lead the most powerful nation in the world

I don’t understand.

You’re always playing catchup when in a conversation with others; they’re racing ahead on the topic, already knowing both sides of the discussion and throwing their own spin on it, and you’re just sitting there staring at them mouth-agape as you try to process what is being said in realtime, but can’t quite grasp even the base concepts nor the terminology of what they’re talking about because their shop talk is so far removed from the baseline that it’s practically a whole subject in itself.

The smart thing to do is to just interject quickly with simple questions to highlight your supposed ignorance, and get some quick definitions to keep you at least somewhat up-to-date in the conversation.

But you don’t… either too ashamed of your own ignorance to draw attention to it, or rejecting it outright instead of facing the humiliation and telling yourself that you’re not that interested in the topic anyway.

That’s how it feels to me, anyhow

dunno

There was a guy on youtube once who uploaded a video talking about this who has the channel name “crazydumbsick”.

Unfortunately I can’t seem to find the video as it looks like he regularly deletes content, and it currently only goes back about a month on his channel at present.

Take everything below with a block of salt because this is from memory, and it was a few years back where I watched his video once, so I could be misremembering one or more things here.

If I recall correctly he has Schizophrenia, Crohns, and an IQ of ~45, hence his channel name. He talked a lot about how hard it was to live, particularly pertaining to his IQ. He said that he has a hard time with remembering things and therefore most of his meals are made from pre-made microwaveable packages as he is capable of operating the microwave without too much difficulty, and he found it generally easy to follow the instructional lists on the packaging.

He made note that operating any kind of machine much beyond a microwave or TV remote was largely beyond him, except his computer and camera which he had recently figured out well enough to be able to record and upload content - but outside of those actions, he really had no idea how to use them.

I believe he also said that due to one or more of his conditions, he could not drive, which largely compounded the difficulties of his life.

He talked about how finding work for someone in his situation is basically impossible and just as impossible to hold onto for very long. I believe he talked about a couple jobs he had been fired from and why, and while I don’t recall the specifics, I believe he had talked about how he was not even entirely certain why he had been fired. I think he said that he had done some things incorrectly, and at the time, had some vague concept of them being incorrect, but despite this, he was unsure why he had gone ahead and done them anyway.

Overall, he seemed very sad in the video; he was terribly aware of how hard it is to live life being himself, and knew that there were basically no solutions to it.

Having said all of that, he continued to upload videos and there were some good events and some bad events. I believe at one or more times he discussed having tried to take his own life. Other times he seemed fairly upbeat and was trying to better himself - trying to read through a textbook on auto work for example.

Anyway, I think the original video I spoke about is one of the better videos I’ve seen uploaded to the internet. It was somewhat sad, but it was highly enlightening and certainly one of the most honest videos I’ve ever seen someone upload.

If you’re using IQ as a measure of intelligence, you probably already know.