Rocket scientists and brain surgeons are no smarter than the general population, according to a new study.

Despite the commonly used phrases “It’s not rocket science” and “It’s not brain surgery” the findings show that both aerospace engineers and neurosurgeons have similar levels of intelligence to those in the general population. 

As such, the researchers say that both specialties might be unnecessarily put on a pedestal, and that phrases unrelated to careers such as “It’s a walk in the park” might be more appropriate.

To help settle the age-old argument of which phrase - “It’s not brain surgery” or “It’s not rocket science” - is most deserved, researchers compared the intelligence of 329 aerospace engineers and 72 neurosurgeons with 18,257 members of the general population. 

All participants completed a validated online test to measure six distinct aspects (domains) of cognition, spanning planning and reasoning, working memory, attention, and emotion processing abilities.

The results show that aerospace engineers and neurosurgeons were equally matched across most domains but differed in two respects: aerospace engineers showed better mental manipulation abilities, whereas neurosurgeons were better at semantic problem solving.

When these scores were compared to the general population, aerospace engineers did not show significant differences in any domains. Neurosurgeons were able to solve problems faster than the general population but showed a slower memory recall speed.

What profession do you think requires the most intelligence?