I do not know if this is strong enough evidence for you, but I offer the following text dump for consideration; from "The Predictive Value of IQ":
...Nuñes (formerly Carraher) has done a series of studies over the years investigating the mathematical skills of Brazilian street children (Carraher, Carraher, & Schliemann, 1985; Carraher, Carraher, & Schliemann, 1987; Nuñes, 1994; Nuñes, Schliemann, & Carraher, 1993). The example of Brazilian street children is an apt one for the illustration of the construct of practical intelligence, because as Nuñes points out, the survival of these children is threatened on a daily basis. If the children are unable successfully to run a street business, and lapse into crime, the chances of their being murdered are quite high. Nuñes has found that the same children who can do the mathematics to run a successful street business are often failing math in school or otherwise show only minimal competence in math in academic settings. Similar results have been obtained by Ceci and Roazzi (1994), suggesting the findings are generalizable across investigators. As pointed out by Anderson, Reder, and Simon (1996), one needs to be careful about the exact conclusions one draws from studies such as these. For example, the exact computations required in one situation may not be the same as the computations required in another. But in terms of [End Page 25] adaptive functioning, the point is that the people who are best able to adapt in one circumstance often are not those best able to adapt in another.
In a related study conducted near Kisumu, Kenya, we found that children's knowledge of the use of natural herbal medicines to combat illness is significantly negatively correlated with scores on tests of crystallized (Mill Hill Vocabulary in English and a comparable test in Dholuo, the home language) abilities (Sternberg, Nokes, et al., in press). In other words, practical intellectual skills were actually inversely associated with academic intellectual skills.
Lave (1988) also did related studies among Berkeley, California, housewives. She found that the same housewives who had no trouble doing comparative price calculations in the supermarket (before the introduction of unit pricing) were unable to complete most of the problems on a standard paper-and-pencil test of mathematical knowledge given in a classroom.
Investigating a different population, Ceci and Liker (1986) found that men's handicapping abilities for predicting outcomes of horse races were unrelated to their IQs. Moreover, successful handicappers had an average IQ of only about 100, despite the complexity of the handicapping task.
Ceci and Bronfenbrenner (1985) looked at quite a different task. They gave children a time-estimation task either in a classroom or at home. Strategies and quality of performance were very different in the two settings, suggesting that the context in which the judgments were made had a major impact both on how they were made and how well they were made.
In a very different context, Fiedler and Link (1994) reported that IQ positively predicted leadership performance under conditions of low stress but negatively predicted this same performance under conditions of high stress; in contrast, acquired knowledge of the kind that is essential for practical intelligence positively predicted leadership performance under conditions of high stress but negatively predicted under conditions of low stress.
Also somewhat relevant http://xa.yimg.com/kq/groups/190222/1077302733/name/Kwon is a brain imaging study of Korean Go players; the expert professional Go players averaged IQ of 93, the control group 101.
From the Go paper:
...Conclusions The results of our study revealed that Baduk experts develop structural fronto–cingulo–striato–thalamic connectivity, as evidenced by increased FA of WM tracts, as compared with those of non-experts. These structures are associated with cognitive processes that include spatial perception, attention, working memory, executive control, and problem solving (Chen et al., 2003). In addition, the experts' increased FA in inferior temporal areas indicates that, unlike the situation in controls, task-specific templates had developed
In school we learn wonderful things like how to find integrals, solve equations, and how to calculate valence electrons of elements based on their atomic numbers. Because, obviously, they will be very important in our futures -- especially if we become artists, musicians, writers, actors, and business people.
We learn so much in school. Yet, when most people look at paintings they don’t truly understand them. When most people listen to music, they don’t really know what they’re hearing. Most people would fail simple music theory tests, even though many have listened to music most days of the week since they were babies!
Similarly, if you have working eyes, you should ask “Why do shadows look like they do? What color is snow, really? Can I predict the colors of different colored materials at different times of the day? If not, why? I have been seeing them for years, haven’t I?”
I think the problem here is that people can’t understand what is really important. Calculus, mechanical physics, chemistry, microiology, etc. are interesting to learn, perhaps. But, they are relatively advanced topics. People don’t use them in daily life unless they are professionals. Why not learn things that we think about every day instead of those that will frankly be useless to most?
Why don’t we learn how to understand our senses?
Learning about sight, sounds, thoughts, etc. should fit in somewhere in the first year of high school. Everyone needs to learn the physics of art and color (e.g. this and this), music theory, rationality, and logic.
For example, why should people start learning (or pretending to learn) philosophy, the art of thinking, in college? Should we be able to make life-changing decisions without even knowing how to spot errors in our thinking?
As a science researcher, I know first hand how hard it is to find a good balance between being well versed in worldly topics and being focused on a field in order to excel in it. But, both of these areas of study should not be called the true basics, in my opinion.
As president of my school's philosophy club, I took a different approach to teaching the basics of philosophy and thinking than traditional classes do. Instead of asking students to discuss the lives and ideas of famous Greek philosophers, I asked them to analyze their own lives and make their own philosophies. As expected, they were terrible at it at first. But, by the end of the year people began to actually think about the world around them.
So, my point is that we should -- in life and in school -- emphasize actual everyday thinking more.
The biggest challenge is that it takes so long!