Common social and emotional experiences for gifted children can reflect: differences in their abilities compared to same-age peers. tendencies toward introversion and perceived issues with social acceptance. conflicts or anxieties associated with their inner experiences of giftedness.
The problems gifted children sometimes face with socializing often stem from their asynchrony and educational setting. Asynchronous development, or uneven development, is often considered a core trait of giftedness. These students may be college age intellectually but still 12 in terms of their social skills.
Gifted children often set very high standards for themselves and get frustrated when they can't meet them. This can sometimes result in tantrums and other difficult behaviour. It's great for your child to work towards high standards. But your child needs to understand that they can't have high standards for everything.
Social interactions may lead to anxiety for many gifted children – especially those who tend to be shy. A fear of being evaluated, perfectionism, hypersensitivity, a tendency toward self-criticism, and even simply being singled out as gifted can all heighten stress and anxiety in young people.
A gifted child can lose interest because she is not challenged or motivated. Gifted children can be difficult to match with an appropriate class because, although they are cognitively ahead, they may be socially younger than their age peers, which can result in behavior problems.
Gifted, talented and creative adults face unique challenges, problems and difficulties while living their lives because of their high intelligence, overexcitabilities and multiple abilities. Gifted, Talented & Creative Adults need: multiple sources of stimulation for their curiosity, talents and abilities.
Even though the gifted are no more susceptible to mental illness than anyone else, some gifted children and teens struggle with overthinking, worry, or cautious alertness. Their nervous system seems wired for heightened reactivity. For some, obsessive thinking transitions into anxiety.
While gifted children may not be any more susceptible to mental health issues as other adolescents, there are certain aspects of giftedness that may influence or amplify a gifted child's experience of mental health issues.
Both giftedness and autism fall on a spectrum, so while there may be individuals who clearly fit into one box or another, some behaviors might be more ambiguous and require additional information, context, or professional opinions.
Gifted trauma stems from childhood issues with feeling like you don't belong anywhere because of your gift. Bullying, starving for mental stimulation, school mismatch, and other issues specific to the life experience of the gifted child may also contribute both to the main mental health issue and gift-specific trauma.
Making friends is often fraught for gifted children. They may find it difficult to find friends in a typical school environment or extracurricular activity. The more gifted they are, the more difficult it may be for them to find social connection with other children their age, and understandably so.
Sometimes, personality traits erect barriers to making friends. “These are just generalities, but often gifted kids are more sensitive and intense in presentation,” says Peters. “They can be more committed to a sense of fairness and justice, and in the context of relationships, this can cause problems.
Gifted children are challenging to parent in many ways. The more gifted the child, the more often it seems the more the parent is frustrated with the discrepancy of someone able to do school several levels above age level but unable to remember to take their finished work to school.
Gifted adolescents have the cognitive capacity to understand the concepts of life, death and other issues, but that does not guarantee competent emotional and social awareness of the matters. They often feel different from their peers as their emotional maturity lags behind their cognitive abilities.
The parents reported that gifted children have higher energy levels than their peers (29). The unique characteristics of giftedness may prone them to anxiety.
Those who are considered “gifted” are especially likely to experience depression, particularly existential depression, a type of depression that centers around thoughts about life, death, and meaninglessness as the name might suggest.
However, the consensus seems to be that, while gifted children are no more or less likely to experience anxiety than their peers, the way they experience anxiety is different due to their unique characteristics, which we review in more detail below.
ADHD AND GIFTEDNESS are sometimes described as having the same or similar characteristics. However, one diagnosis is considered a disability and one, a gift. Neither assumption is ideal in supporting the child identified with either ADHD, giftedness, or both, often referred to as twice exceptional or 2e.
Mildly gifted: 115 to 130. Moderately gifted: 130 to 145. Highly gifted: 145 to 160. Profoundly gifted: 160 or higher.
Gifted children, characterized often by heightened emotional sensitivity, are often highly empathetic, as well. In fact, their empathy may seem overly present in their experience of the world, as any parent whose child has burst into tears about a dead bug on the sidewalk can tell you.
Good career goals for gifted children with harnessed perfectionism include the medical field, technology creation, aviation or aerospace, engineering, architecture, and the legal profession. All these fields and many more call for attention to detail and high reliance on self-direction.
The basis for boredom in gifted people is likely to be related to their characteristics as gifted individuals and their needs: extreme curiosity, the burning hunger for information, high energy levels, and—as Jacobsen identified—intensity, complexity and drive.