America’s Smartest Cities: How Do Oregon Cities Rank?

Friday, August 29, 2014

Jake Thomas, GoLocalPDX Contributor

Corvallis, Ore. is the 22nd smartest core-statistical area in the country, according to Lumosity.

How smart are Northwesterners, and which cities are the smartest overall? A ranking from San Francisco-based Lumos Labs took a stab at this question by drawing on information based on performances of its Lumosity online brain-training programs. And it doesn't look good for Oregon.

Instead of looking at IQ scores and investment or enrollment in colleges, Lumos Labs has developed what it calls the “largest database of human cognitive performance.”

The rankings are based on de-identified data from over 3 million users in the United States between the ages of 18-75 who have played the games, which are aimed at boosting users' cognitive functioning. Data gathered and analyzed by Lumos Labs measured differences in cognitive performance across geographic areas by examining scores from users' first few sessions: that play measured their memory, processing speed, flexibility, attention and problem solving ability. The scores were then ranked by location.

What they found might surprise you.

Residents of the Pacific Northwest's more urban areas might be surprised that Pullman, Wash., a relative backwater, beat them out. The town is home to Washington State University and University of Idaho is nearby. Pullman ranked 10th on the list.

Corvallis, Ore., home to Oregon State University, ranked 22nd on the list. The town's brainpower has given rise to some now large companies. Corvallis was once home to Avi BioPharma, a medical research and drug-development company, and engineering firm CH2M Hill, an environmental and engineering consulting services firm. Just across the border from Pullman, another college town, Moscow, Idaho, home to the University of Idaho, ranks 29th.

Larger cities in the Pacific Northwest scored lower: Bellingham, Wash., scored 57th on the list; the Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue region scored 90th; Eugene, Ore. scored 95th. The Oregon towns of Albany and Newport, scoring 141st 150th respectively, beat out Portland-Vancouver-Hillsboro, which scored 155th.

Lumosity broke down data by towns, which produced slightly differing results. The top 10 towns for sheer brain power are listed below.

Related Slideshow: Top 10 Smartest Towns in America

Brain-training website Lumosity cranked out a list of the smartest towns in America. We're not sure if this ranking really tells us where the braniacs live, or just where the Lumosity power users are.

Either way, it should be no surprise that college towns made top marks.