The 5 ‘Smartest’ and ‘Dumbest’ Cities in America, According to a New Study - VICE

For many adults, the intellectually interesting part of life seems to drop off a few years after college graduation. The seminars are gone, the random late-night conversations disappear, and meeting someone new who actually wants to talk about something besides work can feel annoyingly difficult.

A new study from Maxwell Social tried to figure out which U.S. cities best keep that side of adult life alive. Researchers scored the 50 largest metros using seven measures, including museums, libraries, bookstores, universities, adult education, graduate degrees, and search interest in intellectual activities. They also surveyed 905 adults about whether they’d found anything that replaced the social and intellectual life of school. The answer? Not so much. 

Intellectually stimulating conversation dried up a median of just three years after leaving school, and 1 in 3 adults said they hadn’t had a deep conversation with someone new in over a year. Millennials seemed especially starved for it, with 49% saying they felt intellectually lonely. Across all adults, 61% said stimulating conversation was harder to find now than it had been in school, and 53% said making intellectually curious friends as an adult was harder than dating.

Bars seem to be losing their grip on adult social life too. Among people who still go, 83% called them intellectually empty, and 66% said they’d rather spend the night somewhere built around ideas and conversation. Nearly half said alcohol isn’t really part of their social life anymore.

Singles were even clearer about where they’d rather meet someone. Just 3% picked a bar. Lectures, book events, and classes came in first at 26%.

Finding those kinds of places depends heavily on where you live. Among urban adults, 53% said their area had a decent number of places to engage with ideas, compared with 39% of suburban adults and 28% of rural residents. People living rurally were more than three times as likely to say those spaces simply weren’t available nearby. No surprise there.

There’s clearly an audience for a night out that involves something besides three drinks and yelling over music. About 61% of adults said they would consider paying for membership in a social club centered on ideas and conversation.

The people are there. They’re everywhere, in fact. The places, depending on where you live, are another question.