It's built on data points. As for being smarter than y'all, it is possible. For instance, I made the effort to learn about this stuff rather than remain ignorant (there's a long story behind that). That might be a good indication of intelligence.
Might not be. It might be an indication of self esteme issues that manifested themselve in the need to acquire learning, even to the degree that the respondent readily accepts ideas passed around in "learned circles" for the sake of the self esteme.