Giftedness has an emotional as well as intellectual component. Intellectual complexity goes hand in hand with emotional depth. Just as gifted children's thinking is more complex and has more depth than other children's, so too are their emotions more complex and more intense.
If your child is gifted and talented, you might notice that they have very strong emotions, interests and opinions compared with other children their age. Sometimes gifted and talented children have trouble managing these strong feelings.
Most parents of gifted children won't be surprised that research supports what they can see for themselves: gifted children are highly sensitive to their environment and react with heightened emotional and behavioral responses, more so than do children of average intelligence.
Gifted people are usually also highly sensitive and intense. They are more aware of subtleties; their brain processes information and reflects on it more deeply. At their best, they can be exceptionally perceptive, intuitive, and keenly observant of the subtleties of the environment.
Because their limbic systems are so intense, gifted children may actually struggle more with stimulating environments (such as loud birthday parties) than other children of the same age.
While some gifted children may have a flair for the dramatic, that does not diminish the intensity of their emotions. These children may be experiencing what psychologist Kazimierz Dabrowski called an emotional overexcitability. 2 That means that they actually do experience emotions more intensely than others.
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.
Gifted students may be at a higher risk for anxiety than their non-gifted peers in general (7). It is reported that they are among the risk group and likely to be vulnerable to anxiety (8). Their cognitive maturity and increased awareness were said to promote existential questions and associated anticipatory anxiety.
The 3% to 5% of kids who are particularly gifted are also at special risk for being tagged with an inappropriate diagnosis of mental disorder. Caution is necessary when diagnosing.
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.
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.
Gifted persons are more likely to make sense out of their intellectual experiences than the average person. Another important difference is in the desire to know complex ideas. Average persons have less desire to know ideas for their own sake.
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.
Gifted children may be more likely to experience existential depression, as their minds tend to be more attuned to contemplating the big life and death issues facing the world.
Signs of giftedness can appear as early as infancy and continue during the toddler and preschool years. Testing for giftedness and high IQ, however, usually takes place around age 5.
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.
Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (adhd)
Traits such as intensity, impatience, sensitivity, and high energy are common in children with ADHD, as well as in gifted children.
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 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.
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.
Raising a profoundly gifted child is no different. However, the types of challenges may be. Generally, these children require more intellectual stimulation, even as infants, than other children do, but most families are able to respond adequately to this need in babyhood and the toddler years.
The most common mis-diagnoses are: Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), Oppositional Defiant Disorder (OD), Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD), and Mood Disorders such as Cyclothymic Disorder, Dysthymic Disorder, Depression, and Bi-Polar Disorder.
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.