Sex differences in brain activity related to general and emotional intelligence

The study investigated gender differences in resting EEG (in three individually determined narrow α frequency bands) related to the level of general and emotional intelligence. Brain activity of males decreased with the level of general intelligence, whereas an opposite pattern of brain activity was observed in females. This difference was most pronounced in the upper-α band which is related to semantic memory processes. It was further found that highly intelligent males displayed greater decoupling of frontal brain areas, whereas highly intelligent females showed more coupling between frontal and parietal/occipital brain areas. Similar, but less significant differences were observed for the two area scores of strategic and experiential emotional intelligence. It appears that males and females have different resting EEG correlates of IQ.