Mind you, all the intelligence in the world won't make you a top class player. It takes dedication, a lot of study and a good work ethic too i believe.

Agreed. To become a top chess player a certain combination of factors are needed, above average IQ being a big help.

Certainly some people are better at chess than others. I just wouldn't argue that it is an innate quality within them learn chess faster, but rather the current state of their ever evolving brain. If IQ is completely flexible, it's a useless measure.

Cheers, I'm not sure how flexible IQ can be but it is known to fluctuate depending on a person's mood. For the past couple of days, I've been thinking about how emotional intelligence (EQ) contributes to a chess players performance. I hear and read about the ways chess challenges a person's character and is subject to it. In some respects I've come to an opinion that it's possible that a player's abilities would suffer if they lacked certain traits, or would have traits that would lead them to play less than their cognitive abilities should enable them to. For example, how many times I've had the opportunity to play a much stronger opponent than I am myself OTB and put less practical effort into the game as I waste that opportunity in feeling's of futility and in trying to salvage as much learning experience from the game as possible - while completely absorbed in my opponent's moves while neglecting my own to some extent. It's as though my mind was made up before the first move - I'm playing a lost game... which is nearest to the truth, just not the best approach. Logic would say it's lost at the outset, but to control my behaviour and put my best in is another challenge.

So I suppose my point is this: if IQ and EQ contribute to improving play equally, the task of trully isolating IQ as a measure of chess playing ability/improvement must be twice as difficult - while there is a general tendency for those who have a high EQ to have a reasonable IQ and vice versa, there is little way (otherwise) of distinguishing what exactly gives a player his skills/progress. The IQ inquisition into chess playing will only show a correlation (presumably) but not identify the exact traits; unless a full analysis of every IQ test is taken of every participant in the population to draw upon specific functions and then graph each of those separately and overlapping each one against another, I feel the question will be too costly and time consuming to be practical, but extremely complex, and cool.

If you're after a straight correlation between IQ scores and chess playing skill(s) in a more general way: it would be feasable to invest in a heap of IQ tests and administer them for free (or as an entry "cost", or requirement to an event or tournament) then you could just test players IQs as we already know 100pts is considered the norm'. Obviously these participants would need to have a rating.

I can't figure out what it is you don't agree with TonyDal. Here you seem to agree that a high IQ allows for high achievement in all facets of life (including chess), while you critisize whether the issue has been substantiated. It seems a bit contradictory. Even in previous posts you've seemed to say that you don't agree with the idea of a correlation between IQ and chess playing ability yet here you almost state that this is blatently obvious (which most members have accepted).

I understand that the thread has been "unproductive" toward making a concrete conclusion and that is what you keep complaining about, I believe. If it's such an issue, you could attend other threads instead of following this one; or, continue posting your feelings toward the posts here and continue making a spectacle of yourself.

Excluding sport, religion, the military, politics, government, - for most of which an average IQ (and virtually no unique skills - other than self-promotion, influence, ball skill, and money-grubbing) would be sufficient to be proficient at.

An average IQ is 'sufficient to be a proficent at' chess.(and most other activities)

A higher IQ will be helpful for becoming a top chessplayer.(or almost anything else.)

As mentioned before, IQ takes up a pretty small percentage of what's considered overall intelligence. That said, it is going to be very useful for a very limited number of activities. Most things (but not all) in life could be done very, very well without having an above-average IQ. Higher IQ's might help certain individuals excel in a few things - but think about how many 'above-average' people wind up never reaching their true potential.

Addendum: I'm going to try to post a brief summary of all the posts that have information here within the next few days.

Correction to gambit13

The World Chess Champion Bobby Fischer had 187 IQ

 My bad, I just copied my info off some website

Chess is NOT intelligence!

I had a friend years ago that couldn't count his pocket change, so I estimate his IQ around 70-75. He learned to play chess, and practiced, and practiced. He played better players as much as possbile. After about 5 years his rating was well over 2000. I still get a chuckle out of the memories of the GE Space Center engineers coming over to the chess club at lunch, laughing at my buddy Carmen. Funny they weren't laughing too hard after he kicked their butts all over the place. If I remember right they were crying in their pocket protectors on the way out.

So the clear lesson is, Chess is not intelligence! IT IS PRACTICE!!

Sorry no references for life experiences.

Exactly, Ronald Weasly in Harry Potter doesn't have an IQ of 187. He probably had nothing else to do since he sucks at magic which allowed him to practice chess a lot.

Yes Harry Potter is a concrete source. 

of course it takes intelligence to play chess. you know what it also requires? a sportsman soul, a fighting spirit and as Kasparov has stated (paraphrasing) a desire and ability to engage in prolonged battle with an opponent. these things are distinct from intelligence or IQ. when you take an IQ test you are not engaged in a battle, a fight, with the piece of paper, at least not in the same way as you are when you play chess with another human being or entity. in this respect, it becomes readily evident that someone could be extremely intelligent, have a really high IQ, but not be all that good at chess. I think people often forget that chess is actually a sport, and a sport like boxing or tennis where you have an opponent who is fighting against you, and the full import of this fact. it isn't intelligence alone that makes a grandmaster.

I'm still waiting for the results of the "further study" :P

 Interesting article:  Chess can improve IQ

IQ and Chess

Playing chess is one operation that fully exercises your mind. Chess is quite like a brain tonic which enhances concentration, patience, and perseverance, as well as develops creativity, intuition, memory, and most importantly, the ability to process and extract information from a set of general principles, learning to make tough decisions and solving problems flexibly. Most importantly it teaches one, a golden virtue -- the virtue of Patience.

Concentration, Patience, and Perseverance 

You require immense concentration to play chess. Some of the world's ace players, appear distracted, sometimes scratching their heads, taking a break between moves to walk around. However a closer look reveals that most of these players are actually absorbed in thought, relying on strong visual memory to plan and calculate even when they are away from their game. Chess is a teaching tool that instantly penalizes you for any lapses. One slip in concentration can lead to a blunder, costing you the game.

Analysis, Logic, and Problem Solving

Playing chess well involves multiple aptitudes. Dr Albert Frank found that learning chess, even as teenagers, strengthened both numerical and verbal aptitudes. Some studies have even claimed that playing chess can strengthen a child�s memory.

A 1990-92 study in New Brunswick, Canada, found that by integrating chess into the traditional mathematics curriculum teachers were able to raise significantly the average problem solving scores of their students. These students fared much better on problem solving tests than ones who just took the standard mathematics course.

Verbal skills

How could chess possibly improve English skills? The young students learned to make connections based on chess moves; This helped them connect different aspects of what they read in English courses & texts. Thus, the ability to make connections improves the overall IQ score.

Spatial intelligence

The ability to perceive possibilities for movement is particularly crucial to chess thinking, as is the capacity to build up a system of knowledge and experience. Chess thinking often involves a complex, hierarchical structure of problems and sub-problems, and the capacity for retaining and manipulating such complex structures of data concurrently never deviating from the goals, all correlate with having a high IQ.

Chess and IQ

Chess has been shown to raise student's overall IQ scores. A Venezuelan study involving 4,000 second grade students found a significant increase in their IQ scores after only 4.5 months of systematically studying chess. Tournament chess games, which bind each player to make his move within the stipulated time, hone one's ability to perform under pressure, mimicking environments of most school and competitive exams.

From gifted to retarded chess have benefits for all

Dr Ferguson's four-year study reported that after spending 60-64 hours playing and studying chess over 32 weeks students exhibited significant progress in critical thinking. He further found that chess enhances "creativity in gifted adolescents." Chess benefits are not restricted to gifted children. Chess teacher Michael Wojcio notes that "even if a slow learner does not grasp all of the strategies and tactics in chess, he/she can still benefit by learning language, concepts, and fine motor movement." This often ignites in them a passion for learning.

Age no bar

Chess tournaments are not divided by age but by ability (unlike other sports). Young players can many a times outperform seasoned ones. In 1999-2000 in Australia, for example, a thirteen-year-old won the New South Wales championship, a fourteen-year-old won the South Australian championship and a fifteen-year-old won the Queensland championship.

From gifted to retarded chess have benefits for all

• Visual-spatial processing
• Quantitative reasoning
• Working memory
• Fluid reasoning
• Nonverbal IQ
• Knowledge

Chess studying and playing involves six out of seven factors of the modern IQ test model. Hence subscribing to it would warranty improvement in your performance in IQ tests as per the verdicts of researchers. So if you have never felt the chessboard its time you start arranging your pawns!

(quoted from article @www.iqtestexperts.com)

Elo ~ (10 x IQ) + 1000

so the avarage person with an IQ of 100, would have a max grade of 2000?  That seems very high.

As a maximum, and with enough practice,I would say it's about right. 

Btw, does anyone know of any GM's with particularly low or average IQ's? If the rule is that "IQ doesn't matter" then surely this ought to be the case, right? 

IQ in general is nothing but a test to determine if you are smarter than a dog. Chess requires an intellect of an average 5 year old.

That's ridiculous for at least two reasons. Firstly, becoming a grandmaster of chess takes a lot of years. Secondly, IQ fluctuates throughout life (and likely to increase with improvements in chess).

Further arguments against this would include differences between IQ before/after becoming a titled player, having certain cognitive strengths/weaknesses in those IQ tests (knowing which are relevant to the question), and further complications such as age differences, and IQ correlations between commencing chess play, and becoming a 'grandmaster' in terms of other factors such as age-related cognitive decline which raises further complications such as those same mental faculties being reverted through active usage . . .

Many players become  GM's at an early age, 14 or 15 seems to be the earliest age. That's not "a lot of years" especially if they only "discover" chess at 5 or 6 years of age. The fact is they are "gifted" with extra talent in spatio-logical problems, or however it should be phrased. I agree IQ does fluctuate, but i also believe you can be born gifted, giving a head start to such individuals (the fact that many of them become social misfits is beside the point). I think two key factors in achieving GM level are:

1) Being gifted (much higher than average IQ), and:

2) Focussing that gift onto chess.

I'm still searching for a GM with a low IQ...