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Psychologists who study gifted children are familiar with the following scenario: A child is referred to their school psychologist because of "behavioral problems in the classroom," problems that often include descriptions such as "inattentiveness," "sass," and "outbursts." Following a battery of tests, the school psychologist reports the surprising results. No, the child does not suffer from attention deficit disorder or oppositional defiant disorder. The child "suffers" from...giftedness.

Giftedness can be as much a curse as a blessing. It depends a good deal on the environment within which that giftedness finds itself. To a harried teacher with lesson plans to cover before the bell rings, the seemingly incessant questions of gifted children can seem like a special kind of hell. Gifted children often find age-appropriate lesson plans boring because their cognitive skills may extend well beyond the schoolwork and lessons contained in those plans. On the playground, they can exhibit a trait termed an "unstoppable urge to create" by Dr. Joan Freeman, a specialist in the needs of gifted children. This "urge to create" makes it difficult for gifted children to simply "play by the rules." Although they quickly learn the rules of a game, they just as quickly become bored with them and want to change them - frequently leading to consternation on the part of other children who often find solace and comfort in routine. As adults, the gifted can find the workplace, with its many rules and often rigid power hierarchy, a particularly stressful work environment.

Research indicates that giftedness also is associated with intellectual, emotional, imaginational, sensual, and psychomotor "over-excitabilities". Gifted individuals tend to be emotionally sensitive and empathic, making the normal rough and tumble of the playground stressful for them. Because they often feel they are held to higher standards than their peers, they can find it difficult to accept criticism (anything short of perfection is felt as failure). Their over-excitability can make them stand out from peers (and not in a good way), leading them to feel isolated and misunderstood as children and as adults.

Given these problems, one might wonder whether giftedness is more curse than blessing. But giftedness also carries potential for greatness - not just for the gifted individual, but for those who stand to benefit from their accomplishments. We tune in to sporting events to watch gifted athletes perform amazing feats for our teams. We buy the new inventions created by the gifted that make our lives easier and richer. We read the books and watch the movies that emerged from the minds of those who have a natural talent for story-telling.

So what do the gifted need to reach their full potential? Research shows that these are perhaps the three most important factors:

1. Being with others who are like them. If you've ever watched the TV show "The Big Bang Theory," you know the importance of this factor. The show's main characters are brilliant male and female "nerds" who fit in just fine with each other and stand out like tarantulas on white bread everywhere else. No matter who you are, you need to feel there is a place you belong. A good deal of research indicates that gifted adults who are in frequent contact with other gifted individuals are more likely to feel belongingness and satisfaction, whereas those whose social environments do not include other gifted adults feel isolated and dissatisfied.

2. Education settings that challenge them intellectually. In one study, gifted adults who had participated in advanced placement courses in high school were surveyed 15 years after graduation. Eighty-five percent of participants described their academic experiences in advanced classes as positive, and 88 percent of participants indicated that they would support advanced placement for their children if it were recommended by the school. Another study compared successful and unsuccessful men who were identified as "geniuses" during childhood. Their results showed that, even among geniuses, educational achievement was the major determiner of success in adulthood.

3. Not being treated differently. In her book Gifted Lives , Dr. Joan Freemen points out that once parents, teachers, and peers see that gifted children are advanced, then they start treating them differently. But, as she emphatically points out, they are advanced only in certain areas and are normal children in every other way. Just being labeled "gifted" can create emotional and social havoc. In one longitudinal study, over 100 children labeled "gifted" child were matched for age, sex, and socioeconomic status (SES) with two others in the same school class. The first matched child had an identical IQ score, and the second was chosen at random. The results showed quite startlingly that the group labeled "gifted" had significantly more emotional problems than the unlabeled gifted group during childhood. By 2005, the labeled and unabeled gifted groups (now in their 40's) were not very different in life outcomes, but both groups were much more successful than the randomly selected group. The factors that predicted life outcome for the labeled and unlabeled gifted groups were hard work, emotional support, and a positive, open personal outlook.

You can find more information about giftedness, including how to determine whether you or your child is gifted, in my previous article on gifted testing.

Copyright Dr. Denise Cummins July 15, 2014

Dr. Cummins is a research psychologist, a Fellow of the Association for Psychological Science, and the author of Good Thinking: Seven Powerful Ideas That Influence the Way We Think.

More information about me can be found on my homepage.

Follow me on Twitter.

And on LinkedIn.

Image: iStock

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Even the gifted need these three things to succeed.

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TED Talk - Why Gifted May Not Be What You Think

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TED Talk - Why Gifted May Not Be What You Think

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Why gifted may not be what you think: Michelle Barmazel at TEDxHGSE

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TED Talk - How School Makes Kids Less Intelligent

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TED Talk - How School Makes Kids Less Intelligent

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How School Makes Kids Less Intelligent | Eddy Zhong | TEDxYouth@BeaconStreet

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TED Talk - Prepare Our Kids for Life - Not Standardized Tests

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TED Talk - Prepare Our Kids for Life - Not Standardized Tests

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Prepare Our Kids for Life, Not Standardized Tests | Ted Dintersmith | TEDxFargo

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Gifted and Talented Programs Dumb Down Our Students

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Intelligence should be seen as the end goal, not the starting point

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Are schools for "gifted" students promoting segregation? Here's an argument that they are, from Wendy Lecker, a columnist for Hearst Connecticut Media Group and senior attorney for the Campaign for Fiscal Equity project at the Education Law Center.

By Wendy Lecker

From Brown vs. Board of Education to Connecticut's landmark case, Sheff v. O'Neill, to the language of the Connecticut constitution, the law has been clear. Children have a constitutionally guaranteed right to a public education that is not impaired by isolation based on race, ethnicity, national origin or disability. Therefore, it is unconstitutional to develop and fund education programs that intentionally or unintentionally limit access to educational opportunities based on racial or ethnic backgrounds, or disabilities.

Yet recently, it was announced that schools exclusively for "gifted" children will be opening in Windham, New London and Bridgeport. Whether intended or not, the proposal takes Connecticut back to the ugly era of school segregation.

These three districts plan to pull what they characterize as "gifted" children from their schools and create separate schools "to highlight and encourage the potential" of these particular students. The schools are modeled after the Renzulli Academy in Hartford, named for University of Connecticut professor Joseph Renzulli, and serving "gifted" children in kindergarten and in fourth through ninth grades.

Admission to this school is based on Connecticut Mastery Test scores, grades and a teacher recommendation, although a representative at the school explained that the scores are the "big part" of admissions.

Decades of research have proven that standardized tests are an unreliable and inaccurate measure of student achievement and do not measure student potential. In fact, the data reveal that the strongest correlation is between test scores and socio-economic status.

The gross injustice of relying on these tests scores is apparent at the Hartford Renzulli Academy. In 2011, the school had no English Language Learners (ELL) or any students with disabilities. In 2012, the school had but one ELL student and only 6 of the 120 students were classified as students with disabilities.

The notion that you cannot be "gifted" if you do not speak English or if you need special education services is absurd.

Beyond the faulty admissions criteria, segregating so-called gifted children into a separate school contravenes what we know about a child's educational development. Children blossom at different times. A child who may not display his gifts at 10 may develop them at 13, given the appropriate access to learning. Conversely, a child who may read at an advanced stage at age 5 may find that her classmates have caught up to her developmentally by age 7, thus erasing her perceived "gift."

Cementing children into a classification at one age, and denying them access to higher-level learning deprives those in the lower level of that chance to blossom. Until now, even Joseph Renzulli asserted that his gifted pedagogy was designed to work in all school settings for all children.

The most disturbing issue of all is that creating separate schools for "gifted" children violates Connecticut law and policies prohibiting school segregation. While the equal protection clauses in most state constitutions only bar discrimination, Connecticut's expressly bans segregation as well as discrimination.

In Sheff v. O'Neill, our Supreme Court ruled that segregation has pernicious effects on children whether that segregation is intentional or unorchestrated, and ruled that the state must act to prevent and eradicate school segregation.

Connecticut's state Board of Education recognized that segregation has a destructive effect on children's educational opportunities. In its 2010 resolution against tracking, the board wrote that grouping by ability "limits achievement and stifles expectation and opportunity for college and successful competition in the workplace" because it denies those in lower levels access to a more challenging curriculum and higher expectations.

The board unanimously disapproved any practice that permanently groups students for instruction. As the board noted, the practice of tracking disproportionately burdens poor, African-American and Latino students.

The state board resolved that any school district that assigned students to a particular level based on assessed or perceived readiness had to disclose this fact to parents and report to the state the research proving that this separate placement was necessary, the length of time it planned to deny children in lower levels access to learning with higher-achieving peers, and the demographic characteristics of those children denied access to higher-achieving peers.

Now, only three years later, officials stand silent as Connecticut abandons its commitment to desegregation. Indeed, it appears that our leaders are acting to speed re-segregation.

In recent years the state has dramatically increased funding for privately run charter schools that routinely exclude non-English-speaking students and students with disabilities. And now, we have a proposal for "gifted only" schools, equipped with "gifted only" water fountains, "gifted only" bathrooms and "gifted only" lunchrooms.

Something is very wrong here.

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Do schools for 'the gifted' promote segregation?

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Are schools for "gifted" students promoting segregation? Here's an argument that they are, from Wendy Lecker, a columnist for Hearst Connecticut Media Group and senior attorney for the Campaign for Fiscal Equity project at the Education Law Center. By Wendy Lecker From Brown vs. Board of Education to Connecticut's landmark case, Sheff v.

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These girls launched a campaign to end plastic bag trash in Bali. They impress me every time I watch the video -- their drive, their independence, their persistence, their leadership, their speaking ability, etc.