General knowledge has been found to predict exam results in a study of British schoolchildren. ( April 2021) ( Learn how and when to remove this template message)Ī number of studies have assessed whether performance on a general knowledge test can predict achievement in particular areas, namely in academics, proofreading, and creativity. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. This section needs additional citations for verification. Inconsistent results have also been found for conscientiousness.

Though one study found that extraversion and neuroticism were negatively correlated with general knowledge, others found that they were unrelated. Relationships between general knowledge and other five factor model traits tend to be weak and inconsistent. People high in openness may be more motivated to engage in intellectual pursuits that increase their knowledge. The relationship between openness to experience and general knowledge remains robust even when IQ is taken into account. People high in general knowledge tend to be highly open to new experiences and in typical intellectual engagement. In addition, stress or various emotional levels can negatively affect semantic memory retrieval. Most semantic memory is preserved through old age, though there are deficits in retrieval of certain specific words correlated with aging. General knowledge is stored as semantic memory. As with crystallized intelligence, general knowledge has been found to increase with age.

General knowledge is also moderately associated with verbal ability, though only weakly or not at all with numerical and spatial ability. However, many general knowledge tests are designed to create a normal distribution of answers, creating a bell-shaped curve. IQ has been found to robustly predict general knowledge scores even after accounting for differences in age, and five-factor model personality traits. High scorers on tests of general knowledge tend to also score highly on intelligence tests.

General knowledge test