Prodigies

Prodigies are those children, usually under 10 years of age, who exhibit an adult level of proficiency at various tasks, jobs, or work. A prodigy performs as an adult in a respected, highly demanding domain. Although prodigies can emerge in many fields, most demonstrate their abilities in music, chess, and mathematics. Prodigies have also demonstrated extraordinary abilities in art, languages, literature, mathematics, and science, but to a much lesser extent than in music, chess, and math. Historically, prodigies have been boys almost exclusively, but this has changed rapidly in recent years because the number of girls so identified has increased considerably. This entry provides a historical overview of conceptions of prodigies, reviews the research conducted on them, explores the relationship between prodigies and intelligence, examines ...