According to Technology Networks there appears to be a link between cognitive ability and the voting patterns in the BREXIT referendum in the U.K.

The referendum campaign was fraught with controversy and was incredibly polarising among the British public. The results were a shock to the economy, causing one of the largest single-day losses in the FTSE markets and the value of the British Pound Sterling.

A recent survey of heterosexual couples in the U.K. revealed a strong link between higher cognitive ability test results and voting Remain.

“Our main finding is that for those lowest on cognitive ability, only 40% voted Remain, whereas 73% of those highest on cognitive ability voted Remain."

In conclusion " what our results do imply is that misinformation about the referendum could have complicated decision-making, especially for people with low cognitive ability.”

Interesting indeed.

Dear WTF? - Not Again,

Lower cognitive ability kind of goes with lower paying jobs.

The movement of people under the EU dictates threatened lower paying jobs disproportionally.

While it is a given that lower cognitive ability can mean less critical thinking skills, there is nothing wrong with taking a Brexit stance in the framing of a perceived threat to livelihoods.

For the most part it shouldn't be regarded as illogical.

Anyone with a sufficient cognitive ability should have voted 'No' on referendums which suggest doing something that is logically impossible.

For example, the suggestion to legalise same-sex marriage when it was not illegal to begin with.

I think intellectuals are more likely to sell the country out with a pro-immigration stance, whilst blue collar workers are probably more sentimental to issues of sovereignty.

I agree with SteelRedux "For the most part it shouldn't be regarded as illogical." but perhaps for different reasons.

I don't like this inference that 'dumb people voted the wrong way'.

Britain used to be an empire and global hegemon, then they were no longer an empire.
What make's you think they would be happy being a vassal state of the EU?

On balance, only people who were financially better off by this EU vassal state arrangement would be likely to support it.
You can't blame them for wanting to be independent.

We need not bother ourselves with Brexit and the assumed ‘misinformation’ involved, let alone the insults about the cognition of voters who didn't vote the way they were expected to. But, coincidentally, the foreign editor of ‘Quadrant’ writes that the UK elites think that white working class ‘racism’ did the dirty on Brexit.

Just like the ‘racists’ in Australia put paid to the Voice 60:40.

Popular electoral democracy is a big problem for “ the UN and international bodies, international and domestic courts, trans-national political elites, and above all Left progressive political movements around the world”. Those pesky voters simply won't accept what their ‘betters’ see as essential. So, they must be ignorant or racist, and led by sinister ‘misinformation’.

Fortunately there are still enough ‘deplorables’ left - 60% of the population in Australia's case - to resist blatant attempts to manipulate constitutions and replace democracy with unelected judges and bureaucrats.

It's one thing to tell people that they are misinformed and stupid; entirely another to get them to agree with you.

Professor Paul Whiteley from the UK Department of Government
uses over 10 years worth of survey data and tells us that
the British electorate voted to leave the European Union
with a vote of 52% to 48%.

He explains that from the survey done and the data collected
showed that there had been huge variations in people's
attitudes towards the economy and other factors over the
las decade.

So we can't put it down to just someone's cognitive ability.

Professor Whiteley tells us that the big picture showed that
people did support membership if they felt that the membership
was delivering what they wanted. Things like a prosperous
economy, protection against crime and terrorism, control
over immigration and efficient public services.

If people did not feel that membership helped to deliver
these things, or worse still it prevented the government from
delivering them. People opposed the membership.

Many felt left behind by the changes that were happening in
society and the economy.

There's more at the following:

http://essex.ac.uk/research/showcase/why-britain-really-voted-to-leave-the-european-union