Maybe that explains the world inside the Capital Beltway.
After sifting data from a study of gifted seventh-graders, a Johns Hopkins University psychologist found that boys fascinated by politics tended to have lower achievement and aptitude test scores than those who placed little value on command, control and dominance.
Meanwhile, boys who enjoyed solving puzzles tended to earn higher scores on achievement tests than those with little interest in such "theoretical" pursuits.
Dr. Julian C. Stanley, director of Hopkins' Study of Mathematically Precocious Youth, said he was surprised by his findings, calling the results "very striking."
"It probably is just that people who are interested in intellectual things are smarter than those who aren't," said Dr. Stanley, 76, a nationally recognized researcher who has taught at Hopkins for almost three decades. He added, though, that his findings are "not definitive" and that confirmation would require further study.
Assuming that little boys who like politics become big boys who practice it, does this suggest that those who govern us are, well, not the brightest of the bright?
"I thought of that," he said. "I hate to go out on a limb, but you have very few scientists in Congress. Very few. I don't know what that means. But you have a lot of lawyers."
With a laugh, Dr. Stanley said his findings "won't make Newt Gingrich too happy. But he'll probably claim he's one of the exceptions."
Come to think of it, he added quickly, "he probably is."
A different and less striking pattern emerged among the bright girls in the study. High academic test scores did not match up as neatly with a relatively strong or weak interest in any field.
Dr. Stanley based his findings on a re-analysis of data from a December 1976 Hopkins talent search that recruited bright seventh-graders from the Chesapeake region. Researchers then studied 278 children -- 188 boys and 90 girls -- whose math test scores placed them in the top third of the pool of recruits.
Dr. Stanley noted that all of the children were considered gifted. And, he said, there were some very smart boys in his study who loved politics, while some of the less gifted boys were keenly interested in theory and investigation.
But overall, he said, the larger pattern held for the boys.
For the girls, those who scored higher on "aesthetic" values -- an appreciation of form, harmony and beauty -- tended to earn better test scores. Girls with a strong interest in politics fell in the middle range of aptitude test scores.
Girls with the strongest interest in religion tended to get the lowest scores. But Dr. Stanley cautioned that he didn't think that finding was necessarily accurate. The test used to measure that value, he said, appears to be skewed toward mainstream Protestant and Catholic beliefs.
Dr. Stanley plans to present a paper on his findings at a meeting of the American Educational Research Association in San Francisco in April.
The Hopkins psychologist analyzed data from two distinct parts of the 24-year-old study to draw his conclusions.
To gauge academic ability, students were given a battery of eight aptitude and achievement tests, including the math and verbal sections of the Scholastic Assessment Test.
They were also given the Allport-Vernon-Lindzey "Study of Values" test, used by psychological researchers since the early 1930s to measure interests and attitudes. The test is based on the theory that people's interests can be sorted into six broad areas: aesthetic, economic, political, religious, social and theoretical.
Historically, boys tend to hold theoretical, economic and political values in highest regard. Girls tend to embrace aesthetic, social and religious values.
Over the years, Dr. Stanley has focused on measuring gender differences in college entrance exams. In 1983, he and a colleague published a study that found that males consistently outscored females in math, and they speculated that the difference might result from a mixture of hereditary and environmental factors.
In other studies, he has found that females tend to do better than males in tests of English composition and languages.