Above-average intellectual or creative ability or talent in a particular area, such as music, art, or athletics.

Intellectual giftedness is generally indicated by an IQ of least 125 or 130 (found in about 2% of all children). Children who are extremely creative are also considered gifted, although their giftedness can be hard to identify by academic performance or standardized tests. Giftedness has been defined not only in terms of specific talents and academic abilities, but also by general intellectual characteristics (including curiosity, motivation, ability to see relationships, and long attention span) and personality traits such as leadership ability, independence, and intuitiveness. In general, gifted children are creative, innovative thinkers who are able to envision multiple approaches to a problem and devise innovative and unusual solutions to it.

In the early days of intelligence testing it was widely thought that a person's mental abilities were genetically determined and varied little throughout the...