Have a precocious child? Chances are, she'll grow up to be a druggie.
According to a new study in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, those in the top third IQ bracket from ages five to 10 were more likely to take drugs like cannabis and cocaine when they got older.
Nearly 8,000 people took part in the 1970 British Cohort Study, which measured IQ scores of children at age five and 10, then evaluated their drug habits when they were 16 and 30.
While boys in the top third in terms of IQ were found to be 50 per cent more likely than those with lower IQs to have used drugs such as amphetamines and ecstasy by the time they turned 30, the outcome for women was even more pronounced.
Women with high IQs were more than twice as likely as those with low IQs to have used cannabis and cocaine in the past year.
One possible explanation is that more intelligent people are "more likely to get bored or to suffer at the hands of their peers, either of which could lead to experimenting with drugs," suggested researcher Dr. James White of Cardiff University.
However, Dr. White added that people with higher IQs also tended to lead a healthier lifestyle overall, as they tended to be better informed about diet and exercise.
Pass the Dutchie.
It's supposed to be the happiest day of your life. But Nancy Rogers's wedding day was memorable for all the wrong reasons.
Just as the 32-year-old bride-to-be from Nova Scotia was lacing up her wedding dress and touching up her makeup, she discovered that White Point Beach Resort where she was staying was alight.
Even though smoke was "pouring from the hotel’s main hall", Rogers and her fiancé Michael decided the show must go on and went ahead with the ceremony they'd been planning for months.
“We decided that the most important thing was that we wanted to get married, and we were only an hour late,” Rogers said.
With black smoke and flames shooting 20 metres into the air, Rogers and Michael tied the knot.
As firefighters from 10 units battled the blaze, Rogers held her ceremony in another building at the popular seaside resort.
You have to admire their tenacity. While Rogers and her 45 guests partied, fire ravaged her wedding gifts and flowers. And one of her guests, a Russian woman, lost her passport in the fire.
“It was completely engulfed and everything was up in flames,” she said. “We lost all of that stuff, but that’s not important to us. We got the most important things.”
Mercifully, there were no injuries at the 83-year-old hotel, which was safely evacuated as soon as the fire was detected.
Officials still aren't sure what caused the blaze which provides a dramatic backdrop to many of the couple's wedding photos.
When Stats Canada last checked, 51 per cent of Canadians aged 20 to 29 still lived at home with their parents — that's more than double the figure 25 years ago.
The number was so high, in fact, that it prompted filmmakers Sharon Bartlett and Maria LeRose to document the phenomenon in Generation Boomerang.
“They don’t seem to have that same desire for independence that we had when we were growing up.” Or so 63-year-old Bartlett thought, going into the documentary.
She and LeRose have since discovered that the reasons kids aren't in a rush to leave home are as complex as they are multi-faceted. A tough economy, stringent competition for jobs, and pampered rearing are just some of the reasons grownups stay put.
Meet some of the stay-at-home 'kids': 29-year-old Caleb Reyes, a construction worker whose mom still makes his dinner; 24-year-old Patrick Lermitte, film industry hopeful who looks for work so he can leave his childhood bedroom by his next birthday; 25-year-old Ashlee Conery who moves back home after eight years living solo so she can live save up for her Master's degree.
But the real star of the film is arguably thirty something comedian Phil Hanley, who spins humour from the fact that he still lives in his parents' basement.
While moving overseas in my early 20s was pivotal to my independence, in some cultures generations live together in harmony by choice. Is it a help or hindrance for grownups to carry on living with their parents?
Generation Boomerang airs Thursday at 9 p.m. on CBC TV’s Doc Zone.
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