If You Listen To Beyoncé's Music, You're Dumb (Says Science)


Music, similar to politics and religion, is the type of thing people can debate over for hours and hours. We can get infuriated at each other when we don't see eye-to-eye on the matter, and I'm sure there have been more than a few, if not thousands, of relationships that have ended because one partner thinks Coldplay is the best and the other partner thinks they're the worst… because they are.

Virgil Griffith, a software application writer by day and troublemaker by night, has tracked the musical tastes of U.S. college students and analyzed how they correlate to the intelligence of the listener. He named his study Musicthatmakesyoudumb; yes, just like that, all as one word. See how he's a troublemaker?

How'd he do it? He cross-referenced SAT scores with musical taste, then charted it all out so he could see what the dumb kids like and what the smart kids like. The study included 1352 schools and 133 "popular music acts." His findings were weird, to say the least.

The kids who scored higher were into the following bands, that, as you'll notice, most of which had their heyday in the 90s: U2, Radiohead, Sufjan Stevens, Counting Crows, Guster, Ben Folds, Bob Dylan, Norah Jones and the Shins. Not far behind came in other 90s gems like Snow Patrol, Third Eye Blind, Rage Against the Machine, and the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Which leads me to believe that, overall, college students, in general, have the worst taste in music anyway.

However, when it came to the lowest test scores, those listeners were fans of hip-hop and rap, with country being not far ahead, meaning country fans are smarter than Beyoncé fans, and that just seems wrong. Also, other supposed "dummies" are those who didn't list specific bands, but rather specific genres, with fans of reggae apparently, being the least smart in regards to genres. But the dumbest of the dumb goes to Lil' Wayne fans who, on average, score only in the 800s for SAT scores. Frankly, that is a very sad score and how anyone could even get into college with that SAT score is what's truly baffling to me.

What does this mean? Now you can effectively know the intelligence of a possible date all by asking their favorite bands. No longer will you have to beat them at Jeopardy or demand their IQ score by the second date. So, yes, basically your love life just got so much easier. And! If you've been looking for a way to get out of your current relationship, you now have one: "I'm sorry, Johnny Cakes, but this just isn’t working out. I need to be with someone smart and you think T.I. is some sort of musical legend." Voila!

So, now we have to decide: Is Virgil Griffith really a troublemaker after all? Or a mad genius who just helped you with your love life problems?