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Curvelinear Correlations Between Total Testosterone Levels and Fluid

Intelligence in Men and Women
Üner Tan a; Meliha Tan a
a
Department of Physiology, Medical Faculty, Atatürk University, Erzurum, Turkey

Online Publication Date: 01 July 1998

To cite this Article Tan, Üner and Tan, Meliha(1998)'Curvelinear Correlations Between Total Testosterone Levels and Fluid Intelligence
in Men and Women',International Journal of Neuroscience,95:1,77 — 83
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CURVELINEAR CORRELATIONS BETWEEN

TOTAL TESTOSTERONE LEVELS AND FLUID
INTELLIGENCE IN MEN AND WOMEN
UNER TAN* and MELIHA TAN
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Department of Physiology, Medical Faculty, Ataturk

University, Erzurum, Turkey

(Received 8 December 1997)

The relationship between serum total testosterone (T) level and fluid intelligence (Cattell's
Culture Fair Intelligence Test) was studied in young men and women. There was no significant
difference between IQs of men and women. 1Q tended to increase with T in men, except at very
high T levels. It was concluded that (i) T may be associated with IQ, even in samples with no
sex-related IQ difference; (ii) too low or too high T may be disadvantageous for fluid intelligence
in women; (iii) T may be advantageous for this kind of 1Q in men, except very high T levels.

Keywords: Intelligence; testosterone; brain; women; men

INTRODUCTION

It seems well established that males outperform females in spatial abilities

(Gouchie and Kimura, 1991; Halpern, 1986; Nyborg, 1983, 1988, 1994). It is
then conceivable that the male hormone T may be beneficial for this kind
of cognitive function. Accordingly, it was frequently reported that T may
be advantageous for spatial abilities in animals (Brownson et ul., 1994;
Dawson, 1972; Galea et al., 1994; Roof and Havens, 1992; Williams et al.,
1990) and humans (Benbow, 1988; Christiansen, 1993; Christiansen and
Knussman, 1987; Dawson, 1972; Hier and Crowley, 1982; Janowsky et al.,
1994; Tan 1990a, b; Tan and Akgiin, 1992; Tan et ul., 1993).

*Address for correspondence. Prof. Dr. Uner Tan, Director, Department of Physiology,
Medical Faculty, Ataturk University, Erzurum, Turkey. Prof. Dr. U. Tan is the principal member
of the Turkish Academy of Sciences. Fax: + 90 442 234 50 28; E-mail: unertan@superonline.com.

71
 78 U . TAN AND M. TAN

It was also reported that too much T may be disadvantageous for spatial
abilities; only moderate T levels would be ideal For this kind of cognitive
Functioning (Andrew, 1972; Moffat and Hampson, 1996; Nyborg, 1983,
1994; Shute et a/., 1983; Gouche and Kimura, 1991). Contrarily, some
authors have argued that T may only be disadvantageous for spatial
cognition (Broverman et al., 1964; Klaiber et al., 1967; Petersen, 1976).
The fluid ability (see Cattell, 1987) in relation to T was not as frequently
studied as the standard and not-so-standard tests measuring the spatial
ability. In this regard, Gouchi and Kimura (1991) have suggested that there
was no evidence for a consistent relationship between T concentrations and
performance on some cognitive abilities at which men are not usually better.
However, the fluid intelligence showing no sex differences (see Cattell, 1987)
was frequently reported to be related to serum T levels in men and women
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(Tan, 1990a, b; Tan and Akgun, 1992; Tan et al., 1993).

In light of the above mentioned inconsistent results, we have restudied the
relationship between total T and fluid intelligence in men and women. We
used the Cattell’s Culture Fair Intelligence Test, which primarily measures
fluid intelligence and includes series, classification, matrices, and topology.
There are no sex differences and spatial ability seems to be the most
important factor with some loading on verbal and numerical abilities in this
test (see Cattell, 1987).

METHODS

Subjects
The subjects were 76 male and 27 female students from the Medical Faculty
of Ataturk University (Erzurum, Turkey). They ranged in age from 18 to 22
years, were healthy, and devoid neurological and psychiatric signs and
symptoms. None of the female subjects used oral contraceptives.

Fluid Intelligence
The fluid intelligence was assessed by the IPAT Culture Fair Intelligence
Test (Scale 3A, see Cattell, 1987). This test primarily measures fluid
intelligence, includes series, classification, matrices, topology, and measures
part-whole relations, classificatory similarities, causal relations, spatial
relations, inductive reasoning, and inferential relations.
 TESTOSTERONE & INTELLIGENCE 79

There are no significant sex-related differences and spatial ability seems to

be the most important factor with some loading on verbal and numerical
abilities (see Cattell, 1987).

Serum Testosterone
To measure the total testosterone (T) concentration in blood, venous blood
samples were taken into lithium test tubes at around 10:OOa.m. during the
winter semester. Plasma was separated and serum T concentration was
determined by using tritium-marked radio-immunoassay. A single Coat-a-
Coat kit (Diagnostic Products Corporation, Los Angeles, CA, USA) was
used in measurements. In women, the phase o f menstrual cycle at time of
the testings was random.
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RESULTS

Table I presents the statistical results (N, mean, SD, median, 25%, 75%,
minimum and maximum values of IQ and serum testosterone concentra-
tions). The difference in the median values o f IQs between men and women
was not great enough to exclude the possibility that this difference was due
to random sampling variability (Kruskal-Wallis One Way Analysis of
Variance on Ranks), i.e., there was no statistically significant difference
between IQs o f men and women ( p > .05).
The scattergrams in Figure 1 illustrate the relationships between T and IQ
in women (A) and men (B). In women ( N = 27), relation of IQ to T could be
best described by a polynomial regression equation [IQ = 104.2 + (147.0*
T) (192.5* TI) + (52.2* T3)].This relationship was found to be stastically
~

highly significant ( r = .88, r 2 = .78, F 3, 23 = 19.49, p < .001; Normality

TABLE I The mean, SD. median, 25%. 75%. minimum, and maximum values of IQ & T in
women and men
IQ& 7' N blwn SD Medun 25% 75% Min Mu\
IQ
Men 76 120.9 17.5 124.0 108.8 135.0 78.0 148.0
Worn. 27 121.3 14.0 124.0 114.0 128.0 95.0 143.0
Testos.
(ngiml)
Men 76 7.68 2.6 7.5 5.8 9.5 2.7 14.0
Wom. 27 0.57 0.4 0.6 0.2 0.9 0. I 1.2
 80 U . TAN AND M. TAN

180

160

140
I A MEN j
.........................................................................
, _/---.- , ---J

120

a
100

80

60

40
2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16
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(A) TESTOSTERONE (ng/ml)

: \ \
80 - ................................................................................
, Y.

test: passed, p = .62). In men ( N = 76), the relationship between IQ and

serum T level was also best described by a polynomial regression equation
[IQ = 61.8 + (9.3* T) + (0.13* T2) - (0.03* T3)]. This correlation was also
found to be statistically highly significant ( u = .70; u 2 = .49; Adj u 2 = .46;
F 3, 73 = 22.93; p < .001; Normality test: passed, p = .14); IQ only slightly
declined at very high T levels.
 TESTOSTERONE B INTELLIGENCE 81

DISCUSSION

This study provided evidence that T may be associated with fluid intelligence
in young men and women, but did not support the argument that there may
be no significant IQ-T relationships in tests at which men are not usually
better (Gouchie and Kimura, 1991), since neither men nor women were
better in Cattell’s Culture Fair intelligence Test (see also Cattell, 1987).
The results of this study were based on measurements of the serum total T
concentrations. Gouchi and Kimura, (1 99 I ) and Moffat and Hampson (1996),
instead, measured the salivary T concentrations to analyze the T- IQ
relationships. They argued that only saliva contains free T, which is
biologically active. It is indeed known that serum T exists in three forms:
free, albumin-bound, and sex-hormone-binding globulin (SHBG) bound (see
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Herzog, 1988). Only about 2% of total T occurs in the free form, 43 -45% is
bound to SHBG, and 53-55% is bound to albumin. The SHBG bound T
fraction is not biologically active (Sodergard et al., 1982; Cumming and Wall,
1985). The large pool of T loosely bound to albumin is available to tissues
(Cumming and Wall, 1985) and, hence, measures of non-SHBG-bound
testosterone, rather than free testosterone, may provide a more sensitive
assessment of biologically significant androgen levels (Herzog, 1988). Thus,
the serum total T level can be used in studies concerning IQ - T relationships.
We have found that there was an inverted curvelinear relationship
between IQ and T in women. This suggests that low and high T may be
disadvantageous for fluid intelligence in these subjects. In contrast, the high
concentrations of the salivary T was found to be related to high IQ in young
women (Gouchie and Kimura, 1991; Moffat and Hampson, 1996). These
inconsistencies may originate from the different methods used.
The IQ-T relationship in men was also best described by a polynomial
equation. The declining part of this curve at high T levels was much more
smaller than that observed in women, however. That is, T seemed to be
advantageous for IQ in men. This result was expected, since males out-
perform females in spatial abilities, and hence, T should be beneficial for
spatial abilities in men. The inconsistencies may be related to specific tests
used to assess the cognitive abilities in different studies.
In summary, the results showed that serum T may be associated with fluid
intelligence. In women, low and high T levels were found to be
disadvantageous for IQ. As expected, T tended to be advantageous for IQ
in men. It was suggested that the specific tests measuring different aspects of
intelligence may be accounted for the inconsistencies in the literature
concerning T IQ relationships.
-
 82 U. TAN AND M. TAN

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