TOBACCO AND 
MENTAL EFFICIENCY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
NEW YORK • BOSTON • CHICAGO • DALLAS 
ATLANTA • SAN FRANCISCO 
MACMILLAN & CO., Limited 
LONDON • BOMBAY • CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 
THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd. 
TORONTO /TOBACCO AND 
MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
BY 
M. V. O’SHEA 
Professor of Education, the University of Wisconsin 
AUTHOR OF “SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT AND EDUCATION,” “MENTAL DEVEL- 
OPMENT AND EDUCATION,” ETC. 
j]2eto tforft 
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
1923 
All rights reserved PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 
Copyright, 1923, 
By THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. 
Set up and electrotyped. Published April, 1923. 
Press of 
J. J. Little & Ives Company 
New York, U. S. A. PREFATORY NOTE 
The Committee to Study the Tobacco Problem was 
organized in 1918, with the object of collecting and 
publishing scientific data regarding tobacco and its 
effects, particularly physiological and economic. It was 
ihe direct outgrowth of the great increase in the use 
of tobacco which had been going on for several decades, 
but which had advanced at an accelerated rate since 
about 1910. The personal consumption of tobacco 
in its various forms had risen in the United States 
from 1,8 lbs. per capita in the years immediately fol- 
lowing the Civil War to nearly 7 lbs. per capita at the 
end of the World War. The production of cigarettes 
in particular, which had been about y/2 billions in 1905 
had risen to 46 billions in 1918. The cultivation of 
tobacco leaf required the use of 1,647,000 acres of 
arable land. The amount spent on tobacco directly 
was estimated conservatively at about $1,200,000,000, 
or more than the interest on the public debt incurred 
to prosecute the most expensive war in the history of 
the world. Our tobacco bill has increased fince the 
Committee was formed. We are now estimated to 
spend over $1,600,000,000 a year on this one com- 
modity, not counting accessories such as matches, pipes, 
etc., or the fire loss, of which smoking is now recog- 
nized to be the leading cause. PREFATORY NOTE 
The effects of a commodity which makes such enor- 
mous demands upon our natural resources cannot be a 
matter of indifference to public-spirited citizens. If its 
benefits are greater than its cost, they must be very 
great indeed. If less, then we ought to know what 
the loss is. Teachers, clergymen, physicians, employers 
of labor, legislators, are frequently called upon for 
advice by those who look to them for guidance in this 
matter, and they are interested in knowing whether 
tobacco as commonly used is a useful or a harmful 
element in our national life. Yet there seems to be no 
authoritative source from which information on this 
subject can be derived. On the one hand, the consump- 
tion of tobacco is urged, and successfully urged, by the 
tobacco interests, whose costly advertisements proclaim 
the virtues of the leaf from the pages of our news- 
papers and magazines, from the billboards on the lines 
of our railroads, and in conspicuous places in our towns 
and cities. On the other hand, there are large religious 
bodies which either forbid or discourage the use of 
tobacco on the part of their adherents; there are 
physicians who advise against its use; and there are 
societies, few in number and poor in purse, but rich in 
zeal, which condemn it. The aim of the Committee 
is to furnish to those who would use their influence 
to the best advantage the facts upon which they may 
base intelligent conduct. In other words, it has set 
out to do, with regard to tobacco, what the Committee 
of Fifty on the Liquor Problem aimed to do a quarter 
of a century ago with regard to alcoholic drinks. PREFATORY NOTE 
This Committee, like all groups which aim to ascer- 
tain the truth on a controversial subject, is pretty sure 
to be criticized by partisans on both sides. One group 
will probably claim that it is in reality an anti-tobacco 
society. To others it may seem to be favoring the 
tobacco habit. It is therefore important to state 
emphatically that the Committee contains both smokers 
and non-smokers; that the views of its individual mem- 
bers probably differ considerably with reference to 
different phases of the question, but that they are all 
agreed in the desire to ascertain the facts and in the 
willingness to accept them, whether the ultimate results 
may confirm or qualify the views previously held. 
The financial support of the Committee has come 
entirely from the voluntary gifts of its members and a 
few friends who are in sympathy with its aims. It 
has received no contributions from those who have a 
pecuniary interest either for or against the use of 
tobacco. All gifts have been made solely for an im- 
partial and accurate investigation. 
Inasmuch as the Committee has no publication fund 
and very limited resources, it does not plan to publish 
a systematic series of volumes on all aspects of the 
tobacco problem. It is obliged to content itself rather 
with monographs on special phases of the subject which 
have not yet been adequately covered and to biblio- 
graphical or statistical summaries of work already done 
but not readily accessible. Some of the studies have 
been carried on at little expense to the Committee in 
the laboratories of some of our universities, and some PREFATORY NOTE 
of them have been independently published under the 
names of their authors, without allusion to the Com- 
mittee, but with the understanding that the authors 
reserve on behalf of the Committee the right of re- 
publication if desired. 
Professor O’Shea’s book is the first one to be issued 
in the name of the Committee, and this prefatory note 
is written in accordance with the following rule: “All 
publications issued with the name of the Committee 
are to be accompanied by a statement to the effect that 
the views and conclusions expressed are those of the 
author or investigator, and not necessarily those of the 
Committee as a whole.” We desire to emphasize this 
statement. In authorizing the publication of this vol- 
ume, the Committee merely indicates its belief that the 
work has been impartially done by competent investi- 
gators. It does not make itself responsible for the 
facts, or for conclusions drawn from them. 
The standing of Professor O’Shea, Professor of 
Education in the University of Wisconsin since 1897 
and author of numerous works on education and re- 
lated subjects, is a sufficient guaranty that the Com- 
mittee has acted wisely in its choice of a scholar 
to deal with this subject. It desires to thank Pro- 
fessor O’Shea for the great amount of time and labor 
which he has devoted without compensation to this 
task, and for bearing a part of the expense. It also 
desires to express its thanks to Professor Clark L. 
Hull for his able organization and execution of the 
laboratory work; to his assistants; to the students who PREFATORY NOTE 
have served as subjects for the laboratory investiga- 
tion; and to all who have promoted the work in any 
way, particularly to those who have contributed to its 
funds. 
Since the Committee was organized, it has suffered 
by death the loss of two valued members, John Bur- 
roughs and Sir William Osier. The membership of 
the Committee, as now constituted, is given below: 
Henry W. Farnam 
Irving Fisher 
Eugene L. Fisk 
Austin B. Fletcher 
George Foster Peabody 
Executive Committee. 
The Committee to Study the Tobacco Problem 
President 
Alexander L'ambert, M.D. 
New York 
Secretary 
Professor Leo F. Rettger 
Yale University 
William G. Anderson, M.D., 
Dr.P.H., Director, Yale Uni- 
versity Gymnasium. 
Elmer Berry, Professor of 
Physiology, Y. M. C. A. Col- 
lege, Springfield, Mass. 
Surgeon General Rupert 
Blue, M.D., D.Sc., Dr.P.H. 
Harlow Brooks, M.D., 
M.R.C., Professor of Clin- 
ical Medicine, New York 
University. 
Treasurer 
Professor Irving Fisher 
Yale University 
Walter B. Cannon, M.D., 
M.R.C., U. S. A., Professor 
of Physiology, Harvard Uni- 
versity. 
T. N. Carver, Ph.D., LL.D., 
Professor of Political Econ- 
omy, Harvard University. 
Antonin Clerc, M.D., Mede- 
cin de l’Hopital Lariboisiere, 
Paris. 
Charles B. Davenport, Ph.D., 
Director, Station for Experi- 
mental Evolution, Carnegie 
Institution. PREFATORY NOTE 
Knight Dunlap, Ph.D., Pro- 
fessor of Experimental Psy- 
chology, Johns Hopkins Uni- 
versity. 
Joseph Erlanger, Professor of 
Physiology, Washington Uni- 
versity Medical School. 
Charles P. Fagnani, D.D., 
Professor of O. T. Litera- 
ture and Exegesis, Union 
Theological Seminary. 
Henry W. Farnam, R.D.P., 
Professor of Economics, 
Emeritus, Yale University. 
Frank Albert Fetter, Ph.D., 
LL.D., Professor of Eco- 
nomics, Princeton University. 
Bruce Fink, Ph.D., Professor 
of Botany, Miami University. 
George J. Fisher, M.D., Dep- 
uty Chief Scout Executive, 
Boy Scouts of America, New 
York, N. Y. 
Eugene L. Fisk, M.D., Medi- 
cal Director, Life Extension 
Institute. 
Austin B. Fletcher, LL.D., 
President, Board of Trustees 
of Tufts College. 
Henry Ford, Automobile Manu- 
facturer. 
S. Gley, M.D., Professeur de 
Biologie general au College 
de France, Paris. 
Abel Gy, M.D., Ancien Intern 
des Hopitaux de Paris, An- 
cien Chef de Clinique a la 
Faculte, Medecin Suppleant 
de Ip Consultation de l’Ho- 
pital Beau j on, Paris. 
Winfield Scott Hall, M.D., 
Ph.D., Professor of Physi- 
ology, Northwestern Univer- 
sity Medical School. 
Donald R. Hooker, M.D., 1222 
St. Paul St., Baltimore, Md. 
Reid Hunt, M.D., Ph.D., Pro- 
fessor of Pharmacology, 
Harvard Medical School. 
Jeremiah W. Jenks, Ph.D., 
LL.D., Chairman, Board of 
Directors, Alexander Ham- 
ilton Institute. 
John Harvey Kellogg, M.D., 
Superintendent, Battle Creek 
Sanitarium. 
Howard A. Kelly, M.D., 
LL.D., Professor of Gyne- 
cology, Emeritus, Johns Hop- 
kins University. 
Henry Churchill King, D.D., 
LL.D., S.T.D., L.H.D., Pres- 
ident, Oberlin College. 
S. Adolphus Knopf, M.D., M. 
R. C., Professor of Medicine, 
Department of Phthisiother- 
apy. New York Post-Gradu- 
ate Medical School. 
Marcel Labbe, M.D., Profes- 
seur de Pathologie generate a 
la Faculte de Medecine de 
Paris. 
Samuel W. Lambert, M.D., 
Attending Physician of St. 
Luke’s Hospital, Dean of 
College of Physicians and 
Surgeons, Emeritus. 
Thomas Lewis, M.D., F.R.C.P., 
D.Sc., F.R.S., Physician of 
the Staflf of the Royal Medi- 
cal Research Committee, 1 
Redington Rd., N. W., Lon- 
don. 
Rt. Rev. Edwin S. Lines, 
D.D., Bishop of Newark. 
Warren P. Lombard, M.D., 
Professor of Physiology, 
University of Michigan. PREFATORY NOTE 
Everett W. Lord, A.M., Dean, 
College of Business Admin- 
istration, Boston University. 
E. G. Martin, Ph.D., Profes- 
sor of Physiology, Stanford 
University. 
Hudson Maxim, D.Sc., LL.D., 
Inventor, Consulting Engi- 
neer, Development Dept., E. 
I. du Pont de Nemours & 
Co. 
E. V. McCollum, Ph.D., Pro- 
fessor of Chemical Hygiene, 
Johns Hopkins University. 
J. Horace McFarland, Secre- 
tary and Treasurer of J. 
Horace McFarland Co. 
R. Tait McKenzie, M.D., Pro- 
fessor and Director, Dept, of 
Physical Education, Univer- 
sity of Pennsylvania. 
Rev. Thomas Clinton Mof- 
fett, D.D., Superintendent, 
Indian Work, Presbyterian 
Board of Home Missions. 
John R. Murlin, Ph.D., Sc.D., 
Professor of Physiology, 
University of Rochester. 
M. V. O’Shea, B.L., Professor 
of Education, University of 
Wisconsin. 
Col. W. O. Owen, Medical 
Corps, U. S. Army (Ret.), 
Curator, Army and Medical 
Museum and Laboratory. 
George Foster Peabody, LL.D., 
Saratoga, N. Y. 
Pierre Schrumpf - Pierron, 
M.D., Paris-Neuilly. 
Weston A. Price, D.D.S., M.S., 
Director, Research Institute, 
National Dental Assoc. 
. Joseph E. Raycroft, M.D., 
Professor of Hygiene, 
Princeton University. 
H. H. Roberts, M.D., Attend- 
ing Physician, White Sulphur 
Springs. 
Oscar H. Rogers, C.E., M.D., 
Chief Medical Director, N. i. 
Life Insurance Company 
Frederick W. Roman, Ph.D., 
Special Collaborator, U. S. 
Bureau of Education. 
Dudley A. Sargent, M.D., 
D.Sc., President, Sargent 
School for Physical Educa- 
tion. 
Frederick Tilney, M.D., Pro- 
fessor of Neurology, College 
of Physicians and Surgeons. 
Henri Vaquez, M.D., Profes- 
seur a la Faculte de Medecine 
de Paris. 
Harvey W. Wiley, M.D., 
Ph.D., LL.D., D.Sc., Contrib- 
uting Editor, Good House- 
keeping Magazine. 
C.-E. A. Winslow, M.S., Dr. 
P.H., Professor of Public 
Health, Yale University. 
John William Withers, Ph.D., 
LL.D., Superintendent of 
Schools, St. Louis, Mo. EXPLANATORY NOTE 
For many years I have had relations with parents 
and teachers which have led them to seek my advice in 
respect to matters pertaining to the care and culture 
of youth. One problem which has troubled these 
parents and teachers relates to the effect of tobacco on 
the young. I have been frequently asked whether 
smoking is detrimental to a youth’s mental develop- 
ment, and whether it accelerates or retards intellectual 
processes. With a view to securing reliable informa- 
tion which could be passed on to parents and teachers, 
I have at one time or another looked through piles of 
books and articles—some of them are listed in the 
Bibliography appended to this volume—dealing with 
the effect of tobacco on the human mind and body. 
After years of searching I concluded that practically 
all that had been written on the influence of tobacco on 
mental function was based on the peculiar bias or pre- 
judice of the authors—illustrations of this fact are 
presented in Chapter II of this volume—so I decided 
to make an attempt myself to secure data on this sub- 
ject which would not be colored by prejudice or propa- 
ganda. 
This book describes investigations that have been 
carried on for several years under my direction, to- 
gether with the results that have been reached. Plans EXPLANATORY NOTE 
were developed at the outset which would require ex- 
tensive experimental work, and also an elaborate study 
of the scholastic records of pupils in elementary and 
high schools. Large expense would have to be incurred 
for psychological apparatus and assistants and for the 
payment of subjects who would be required for tests; 
so I asked the American Committee for the Study of 
the Tobacco Problem—I was at the time Chairman of 
the sub-committee appointed in 1918 to study the effect 
of tobacco on mental functions—if it could extend 
financial aid so that the investigation as planned could 
be carried through. The Committee agreed to lend a 
hand, provided that the investigation could be conducted 
in a scientific spirit so that bias for or against tobacco 
would not play any role. This was, of course, exactly 
in accord with my desires and intentions, so I accepted 
the proffered help. 
I have been fortunate in securing the co-operation of 
a number of men and women who have assisted in the 
experimental work, notably Dr. Clark L. Hull, associate 
professor of psychology and director of the psycho- 
logical laboratory at the University of Wisconsin. 
Upon my request, Dr. Hull undertook the experimental 
investigation of the influence of tobacco upon the in- 
tellectual processes. He worked out the methods of 
investigation in detail, devised special apparatus and 
technique which would surmount the obstacles which 
had theretofore lain in the way of successful tobacco 
experimentation, and either carried out in his own EXPLANATORY NOTE 
person or had immediate and detailed supervision of all 
the laboratory and statistical work reported in Part III. 
The description of apparatus and methods of investiga- 
tion together with the tabular results of the extensive 
experimentation presented in brief in Part III, are 
based upon Dr. Hull’s reports. For the form of the 
summarizing tables and the interpretation of the ex- 
perimental data, however, I take entire responsibility. 
Dr. Hull is himself publishing in a separate work a full 
and exact account of the methods, apparatus, and re- 
sults of the experimental investigation together with 
proper interpretations. 
I have had valued help from many persons in the 
different phases of this investigation. Miss Grace M. 
Stafford, of Oklahoma University, has reviewed gen- 
eral and biographical literature dealing with the effects 
of tobacco on mental processes. Mr. Roland T. 
Schaefer, Mr. W. F. Livingston, Mr. C. H. Matravers, 
and Mr. E. F. Patten, all of whom are capable investi- 
gators, have assisted in the experimental or statistical 
work. A large number of superintendents and princi- 
pals of schools and high-school faculties throughout 
the country have co-operated with me in securing data 
bearing upon the intellectual work of pupils, and in 
making intelligence tests upon smokers and non-smok- 
ers. The kind of assistance they have rendered is de- 
scribed in Chapters VI and VII. Further, many men 
of distinction have answered a questionnaire relating to 
their personal experience with tobacco; and managers 
of personnel of great industrial organizations have EXPLANATORY NOTE 
given testimony regarding the relation of tobacco to the 
efficiency of their employees. A number of the most 
distinguished women authors in America have re- 
sponded to a request for information regarding the 
habits of women writers respecting the use of tobacco. 
Margot Asquith, in England, and Professor Roman, in 
France, wrote me in response to the question, Are the 
men in England and France who are achieving the most 
in various fields of activity demanding intellectual 
poise and acumen users of tobacco, or are they ab- 
stainers? The data derived from all these sources are 
presented and commented upon in Part I. 
Dean Charles Hughes Johnston, of the University 
of Illinois, had for a number of years before his un- 
timely death been making a study of the effect of 
tobacco upon his own emotional and intellectual proc- 
esses. He had also accumulated a large number of 
articles dealing with various phases of the tobacco 
problem. After Dean Johnston’s death, Mrs. John- 
ston turned over to me all her husband's charts, mem- 
oranda, and clippings. Her courtesy is hereby 
gratefully acknowledged. 
Professor Henry W. Farnam and Professor Irving 
Fisher, both of Yale University, have been of great 
assistance in the prosecution of this investigation, from 
the beginning to the end. They have advised regarding 
the problems that should be attacked and the technique 
of investigation, and they have also read the manu- 
script and have suggested certain desirable modifica- EXPLANATORY NOTE 
tions. Without their constant co-operation, the com- 
pletion of this undertaking would have been difficult. 
The plans as originally developed contemplated that 
experimental work would be done upon high-school 
pupils and upon women; but as the investigation pro- 
ceeded, it was decided that it would be inadvisable to 
ask any woman or any immature boy who had never 
used tobacco to undergo experiments which would re- 
quire smoking. It is quite unlikely that women would 
be affected fundamentally differently from men; al- 
though it may be suggested in passing that an investi- 
gator who has the facilities and the patience to 
undertake this work might well repeat with women the 
experiments made with men and described in Part III. 
There is an added reason why it was determined not to 
subject women to the tests. An ambitious newspaper 
reporter who had never visited the University of Wis- 
consin, so far as the writer knows, concocted a story 
and circulated it widely to the effect that girl students 
in the University were being paid by me to smoke and 
chew tobacco in order that the effects upon their 
minds might be studied; and some parents having 
daughters attending the University became apprehen- 
sive lest they should be lured into undesirable practices. 
The writer takes this opportunity to say that he never 
asked any girl or woman to smoke or chew tobacco for 
the purpose of determining the effect on her mind, or 
for any other purpose whatsoever. It may be added 
that no man who underwent the tests in this investiga- EXPLANATORY NOTE 
tion was asked to chew tobacco and, so far as the 
writer is aware, no one of them ever humored himself 
in this manner. 
It should be borne in mind by the reader that the 
present investigation is concerned solely with the effects 
of smoking tobacco on the intellectual processes. No 
effort whatever has been made to discuss the medical, 
physiological, aesthetic, economic, industrial, or socio- 
logical aspects of the tobacco problem. 
M. V. O’Shea. 
The University of Wisconsin. CONTENTS 
PAGI 
Prefatory Note v 
Explanatory Note xiii 
PART I 
Data Derived from Observation, Introspec- 
tion, and Biography 
CHAPTER 
I. Conflicting Opinions 3 
II. The Habits of Prominent Persons of the Past 
Respecting the Use of Tobacco 16 
III. Testimonies of Men and Women of Distinction 35 
IV. Testimonies of Men and Women of Distinction 
(Concluded) 73 
V. The Verdict of Observation, Introspection, and 
Biography 99 
PART II 
Data Derived from School and College 
Records 
VI. Reports from Various Investigators 119 
VII. Testimony of Principals and Faculties of High 
Schools 134 
VIII. The Verdict of School and College Records . . 149 CONTENTS 
PART III 
Data Derived from the Psychological Labora- 
tory 
CHAPTER PAGE 
IX. The Problems in Laboratory Investigation . . 163 
X. The Control of Disturbing Factors in the In- 
vestigation of Tobacco 177 
XI. The Effect of Tobacco upon Certain Physiologi- 
cal and Motor Processes 185 
XII. The Effect of Tobacco upon Intellectual Proc- 
esses 201 
XIII. Tobacco and Mental Efficiency—Conclusions . 220 
Bibliography 237 
Index 253 PART I 
DATA DERIVED FROM OBSERVATION, 
INTROSPECTION AND BIOGRAPHY TOBACCO AND MENTAL 
EFFICIENCY 
CHAPTER I 
CONFLICTING OPINION 
A glance at the Bibliography appended to this vol- 
ume may suffice to convince any one that tobacco has 
received a good deal of attention during the last three 
or four centuries. In fact, a fierce warfare has been 
waged over it ever since it was introduced into Europe. 
Many men have attacked it and reviled it, while many 
others have praised it and extolled its virtues. In 
recent times there have been but few topics—religion, 
wine, and woman, perhaps—which have incited a 
greater amount of written expression than has tobacco. 
It is as true now as it was three hundred years ago that: 
Tobacco engages 
Both sexes, all ages, 
The poor as well as the wealthy; 
From the court to the cottage, 
From childhood to dotage, 
Both those that are sick and the healthy. 
Merely by way of illustration, reference may be made 
to the work of A. W. Bain who, in 1836, published 
3 4 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
seventeen large folio volumes on “Tobacco: Its His- 
tory and Associations, Use and Abuse,” etc. He 
labored for thirty years on the task of gathering to- 
gether some of the outstanding views on tobacco. He 
called it “a wonderful weed” and claimed that his work 
proved it to be “a comfort to kings, as well as a solace 
to beggars.” 
The deepest impression made upon the writer of the 
present volume by a survey of the literature on the 
effects of tobacco on mental efficiency relates to the in- 
fluence of prejudice, preconception, and individual 
experience upon men’s opinions. Without attempting 
to be statistically accurate, it may be said that in gen- 
eral literature there are as many writers who extol to- 
bacco for its beneficial effects upon the mind as there 
are writers who damn it on account of its supposed 
disastrous influence upon all mental processes. There 
is hardly a statement made by any writer in favor of 
tobacco that cannot be matched with an exactly con- 
trary statement by another writer possessing a different 
bias or different personal experience. 
Fielding exclaims: “What a glorious creature was 
he who first discovered the use of tobacco.” And 
Lamb, before he had to give up tobacco for his health, 
said of it: 
The Old World was sure forlorn, 
Wanting thee. 
Bacon thought that “tobacco cheers and comforts the 
spirits, and contributes to alleviate fatigues and to dis- CONFLICTING OPINION 
5 
charge the body from weariness,” while Kingsley called 
it, “ a lone man’s companion, a bachelor’s friend, a 
hungry man’s food, a sad man’s cordial, a wakeful 
man’s sleep, and a chilly man’s fire.” On the other 
hand, Beaumont and Fletcher ask: 
“Pray, gentlemen, what good does this stinking to- 
bacco do you?” 
“Nothing, I warrant you, but make chimneys of your 
faces.” 
And Cartwright warns the boys of England against 
smoking in the following vein: 
Look at the sallow face and the lean stunted figure 
of the young man who when a boy was a cigarette 
smoker. He is like a broken-down old man. If he 
looks down from a height he becomes dizzy. And 
how stupid and lazy he is! He seems a regular loafer. 
The least thing makes his limbs tremble and his heart 
beat. Such is the evil work of the cigarette upon the 
tender frame of growing lads. 
Yes boys, I repeat it, the deadly cigarette is your 
worst enemy, and the worst enemy of the country; and 
you who smoke it will help this enemy to ruin the 
British Empire by making its future men pigmy 
dwarfs with little bodily strength and even less strength 
of mind. 
Schaeffer is even harsher in his condemnation of the 
weed when he says: 
Tobacco chewers and smokers are universally ir- 
ritable . . . snappish to their wives, churlish to their 
children, and cross to everybody and everything. . . . 
Tobacco produces a perpetual souring of the temper; a 6 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
cross-grained, ill-natured, repelling, or depraved state 
of combativeness. ... It leads to intemperance. . . . 
Its confirmed votaries are a species of drunkards, 
rakes, wantons, tyrants, and friends of publicans and 
sinners. 
A large number of the writers on tobacco maintain 
that it quickens the imagination. Jouberts gives ex- 
pression to this view in the following: 
There is brain excitement caused by the beneficent 
fume of this admirable weed. This sensation produces 
a “far niente” which it is impossible to describe. It 
imparts the pleasantest thoughts to the soul and 
magical impressions to the sensorium: what a crowd 
of ideas does he find in his brain when his organiza- 
tion is saturated with the fumes of tobacco! How 
vivid they are! It is then that his head seems to dilate 
by the organic repercussion which spends its entire 
force upon the brain. All these repercussions are so 
many sparks which produce a kind of intellectual con- 
vulsion, which often gives rays of imagination even 
to those brains which Nature has not favored. 
Van Geist, speaking of his own experience with to- 
bacco, says: 
Not only did it induce that calm and elevation which 
was its common effect, but it quickened, or rather it 
loosed, my imagination, and so set in motion my crea- 
tive power, that I could fancy myself in whatever sit- 
uation I chose, doing and saying, and seeing others do 
and say, with all the vividness and pleasure of reality. 
He says the effect would also CONFLICTING OPINION 
7 
turn the mind back on itself. ... It soothes the 
mind to that quickness and imperceptible activity which 
generally accompanies light reading. It subdues every 
prominent emotion. . . . The mind falls into a state 
of easy, noiseless activity, independent of will. 
Bert L. Taylor (B. L. T. of the Chicago Tribune) 
reinforces the view that tobacco stimulates the imagina- 
tion, saying: 
Home-bound from the land of firs, I slip into the 
packsack an unbroken package of this wonder-working 
weed, which, set alight on winter evenings, pictures 
more truthfully than the camera the roads of summer. 
. . . So, if you are a lover of the wild, come fill a 
pipe. The tobacco is strong and housewives vow it is 
unfragrant, but none other brings such pleasing pic- 
tures. 
Still further, Dr. Walsh, writing in the Technical 
World Magazine on the “Truth About Tobacco,” 
maintains that: 
There is a psychological basis in stating that anything 
pleasurable stimulates the imagination and is conducive 
to reverie. Now, much of original scientific research, 
and nearly all inventions, are based upon scientific use 
of the imagination. Much of the work of the poets 
and novelists is likewise due to reverie. A great finan- 
cier or railway president may also plan a coup while 
physically relaxed but mentally stimulated in a pleas- 
urable way by the taste or odor of a good cigar. 
All creative work of a purely mental nature, which 
is at the same time largely dependent on a quick and 
lively imagination, may be said to be assisted by to- 8 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
bacco, but for briefer periods only. To those, then, 
who live or take their recreation through the imagina- 
tion, tobacco is both a pleasure and a spur to efficiency. 
Howells, in his “Familiar Letters,” praises tobacco, 
contending: 
It is a good companion to one that converseth with 
dead men, for if one hath been poring long upon a 
book or is toiled with the pen, or stupefied with study, 
it quickeneth the brain and dispels the clouds that 
usually overset the brain. 
Looking on the other side, Holmes, in “The Auto- 
crat of the Breakfast Table,” says: 
I do not advise you, young man, to consecrate the 
flower of your life to painting the bowl of a pipe, for, 
let me assure you, the stain of a reverie-breeding nar- 
cotic may strike deeper than you think. I have seen 
the green leaf of early promise grow brown before its 
time under such nicotian regimen, and thought the 
umbered meerschaum was dearly bought at the cost of 
a brain enfeebled and a will enslaved. 
William Cowper would have us understand that to- 
bacco slows down the mind. One phrase from his 
“Conversation” will convey his idea: 
The pipe, with solemn interposing puff, 
Makes half a sentence at a time enough; 
The dozing sages drop the drowsy strain, 
Then pause, and puff—and speak, and pause again. 
A more modern writer, Towns, has this to say: CONFLICTING OPINION 
9 
I consider that tobacco smoking is the greatest vice 
devastating man to-day, because it is doing more than 
any other vice to deteriorate the race. 
Elbert Hubbard frequently advised employers not 
to engage any one who smokes cigarettes, because he 
is a defective who will drag any one he can clutch 
with his nicotine fingers beneath the wave with him. 
Count Leo Tolstoy never missed an opportunity to 
condemn tobacco because of its degenerating effect, as 
he thought, upon the human mind. Hudson Maxim 
warns youth against the use of tobacco, claiming that: 
The wreath of cigarette smoke which curls about the 
head of the growing lad holds his brain in an iron grip 
which prevents it from growing and his mind from 
developing just as surely as the iron shoe does the foot 
of the Chinese girl. ... If all boys could be made 
to know that with every breath of cigarette smoke they 
inhale imbecility and exhale manhood, that they are 
tapping their arteries as surely and letting their life’s 
blood out as truly as though their veins and arteries 
were severed, and the cigarette is a maker of invalids, 
criminals, and fools—not men—it ought to deter them 
some. The yellow finger stain is an emblem of deeper 
degradation and enslavement than the ball and chain. 
Bodine, speaking in this connection, says: 
I have sent 1,115 boys to the Chicago Parental 
School, a school for habitual truants under fourteen 
years of age, together with a few class-room incor- 
rigibles. Eighty per cent of this number were ciga- 
rette smokers. In considering these figures it should 10 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
be borne in mind that all during the time I am speaking 
of there was a state law in Illinois, reinforced by mu- 
nicipal ordinances, forbidding the sale or giving away 
of cigarettes to minors. I have here some statistics 
to prove beyond a doubt that cigarettes create the back- 
ward pupil, and from the ranks of the backward pupil 
we get most of our habitual truants. The boys sent to 
this institution range in age from seven to seventeen. 
The average age is eleven and a half. I found many 
boys who were twelve, thirteen, and thirteen and a half 
years of age who were only in first, second, or third 
grade. Of these boys at the parental school 301 came 
from the third grade, 217 came from the second grade, 
189 from the first grade, 146 from the fourth, 47 from 
the fifth, 140 from the sixth, only 4 from the seventh, 
and 1 from the eighth. The boys who were in the 
sixth, seventh, and eighth grades did not smoke cig- 
arettes. 
The habitual truant, as a rule, is a dull pupil and 
backward in his grade. His physical and mental de- 
fects are caused partly by environment and lack of 
nourishing food, partly by his cigarette smoking. The 
habitual truant almost invariably is addicted to the use 
of cigarettes. Truancy is the cradle of crime. A box 
of cigarettes and a nickel library can easily make a 
truant, and such a truant, poisoned in mind and body, 
is the future enemy of society. 
There are very few girl truants. A truant boy’s 
sister has the same lack of nourishing food, the same 
environment; but the boy smokes cigarettes and the 
girl does not; and the girl goes to school. Now there 
is a contrast for you. The girl is usually up in her 
grade, and the boy is not. He is behind because he is 
dull. He frequently fails to be promoted. He makes 
little or no progress. Finally he gets to be so much CONFLICTING OPINION 
11 
xarger and older than the other children in the grade 
he is in that he is ashamed and does not want to stay- 
in school any longer, and therefore he becomes a 
truant. Why is he dull ? That is the question. I think 
cigarettes contribute in a measure to his mental and 
physical condition. 
In reading the authors mentioned in the Bibliog- 
raphy, one comes time and again upon the view that 
there are aesthetic as well as intellectual delights to be 
derived from a cigar, a pipe, or a cigarette. Sandeau’s 
enjoyment of the fragrance of tobacco smoke and the 
idealistic situation into which the smoker is put is 
typical of similar experiences which one will find de- 
scribed in detail by writers of both prose and poetry. 
Says Sandeau: 
Let me tell you, that if you have never found your- 
self extended upon a divan with soft and downy 
cushions on some winter’s evening before a clear and 
sparkling fire, enveloping the globe of your lamp or 
the white light of your wax candle with the smoke of 
a well-seasoned cigar, letting your thoughts ascend as 
uncertain and vaporous as the smoke floating around 
you, let me tell you, I repeat, that if you have never 
yet enjoyed this situation you have still to be initiated 
into one of the sweetest of our terrestrial joys. The 
cigar deadens sorrow, distracts our enforced inactivity, 
renders idleness sweet and easy to us, and peoples our 
solitude with a thousand gracious images. Solitude 
without friend or cigar is indeed insupportable to those 
who suffer. It is through the fragrant weed that we 
drift into indolence, and become dreamy, contemplative, 
useless creatures. 12 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
Three hundred and fifty years ago Lilly wrote: 
Gather me balme and cooling violets 
And of our holy herbe nicotian, 
And bring withall pure honey from the hive 
To heale the wound of my unhappy hand. 
But there are probably as many persons who think 
tobacco is filthy and abominable as there are those who 
think it is delightful and exquisite. Says John Bur- 
roughs : 
I am an implacable enemy of tobacco in any form. 
The habit is one of the filthiest and most offensive 
mankind ever formed. A smoker is a nuisance in- 
doors and out. He poisons the air even on the street, 
and in cars and hotels and restaurants the taint of his 
foul fumes is over all. A public smoker is a public 
nuisance of the most disgusting kind. He should be 
compelled to retreat to some underground cave or cell 
when he indulges his passion for the poisonous weed. 
President Bascom, speaking of the effect of tobacco 
upon those who use it, maintains: 
The habit is vulgar and low in all its associations. 
It uniformly degenerates into that which can only be 
fittingly characterized as filthy. No one who uses to- 
bacco can fully escape the taint. His breath is im- 
pregnated with it; his clothes are full of it; his presence 
is a constant reminder of it to delicate organs. The 
use of tobacco is an unclean habit and belongs to un- 
clean persons. There are few spectacles giving a more 
disgraceful impression of our civilization than that 
of a mere lad sporting a pipe or a cigar in self-con- CONFLICTING OPINION 
13 
gratulatory imitation of the bad habits of those older 
in years than himself, but alike immature in wisdom. 
Schaeffer is still more emphatic in his denunciation 
of those who use tobacco: 
Talk about a decent man or woman who either 
chews, snuffs, or puffs! . . . No sensible man or 
woman will believe it. Tell me a man who chews 
tobacco is virtuous. I know better. Tell me a man 
who chews tobacco is wicked and licentious, and I will 
then believe you. ... If then tobacco be good, how 
is it that the lewdest, loosest, basest, foolishest, the 
most unthrifty, most intemperate, most vicious, most 
debauched, most desperate, pursue it most; the wisest 
and the best abhor it, shun it, flee it, as the pest ? 
One does not need to have recourse to books or ar- 
ticles in order to find disagreement of opinion regard- 
ing the effects of tobacco upon mental functions; he 
can find such conflict among his friends. Undoubtedly 
the reader has had experience similar to that of the 
writer; he has listened to heated debates regarding the 
effects of tobacco upon the human mind. The writer 
has heard about as many persons praise tobacco as 
condemn it. He has been attending educational con- 
ventions for twenty-five years, and he has heard it said 
very often that pupils who use tobacco are injured 
physically and mentally, but during this period the pro- 
portion of school superintendents, principals, and 
teachers who have become habituated to the use of 
cigarettes, cigars, and pipes has continually increased, 
until now probably the majority of the men who attend 14 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
the great educational conventions held each year in- 
dulge in tobacco in some form. The writer has asked 
many of these men if they could tell whether to- 
bacco quickened their intellectual processes or slowed 
them down, and the number of those who thought that 
cigarettes, cigars, or pipes were detrimental to their own 
intellectual efficiency is so small that it is negligible. 
The writer has also asked many superintendents, prin- 
cipals, and teachers who do not use tobacco whether 
they thought any one could do more and better intel- 
lectual work without it and the answer has been uni- 
formly in the affirmative. 
The writer has for years listened to lively and pro- 
tracted debates among his university colleagues re- 
garding the influence of tobacco on the human mind. 
Some have been for it, and some have been against it; 
and most, if not all, of them, like the school superin- 
tendents, principals, and teachers, have based their 
opinions upon their individual experiences, preconcep- 
tions, and prejudices. Most of those who have become 
addicted to the use of tobacco in any form maintain 
that it quickens and strengthens their faculties, and 
especially that it stimulates creative intellectual activity. 
They claim also that in intellectual fatigue, tobacco 
acts as a pacifier and a sedative and so prevents nervous 
waste. On the other hand, those who have never used 
tobacco, or having indulged in it once have abandoned 
it, stoutly maintain that it retards intellectual activity, 
and dulls the mental faculties. These colleagues differ 
regarding the effect of tobacco upon the intellectual CONFLICTING OPINION 
15 
work of students as widely as they differ respecting its 
effect upon their own mental processes; that is to say, 
they hold the most divergent views, and each group at- 
tempts to explain a particular case of intellectual bril- 
liancy or stupidity as due to the influence of tobacco or 
to some other cause, according to the particular preju- 
dices of the group. 
One who has for the last twenty or twenty-five years 
read articles in the general magazines pertaining to the 
effect of tobacco on the human mind, could hardly fail 
to have become impressed, alike with the lack of agree- 
ment in the views of those who have written on the 
subject and with the dogmatic character of their as- 
sertions for or against tobacco. If the reader will 
glance through a dozen or two of the recent books and 
articles listed in the Bibliography, he will see that there 
is slight possibility of gaining light on the subject in 
which we are interested by consulting historical or cur- 
rent writings on the matter. CHAPTER II 
THE HABITS OF PROMINENT PERSONS OF THE PAST 
RESPECTING THE USE OF TOBACCO 
Have the men who have been leaders in the various 
fields of human thought and action during the last 
three hundred years been addicted to the use of to- 
bacco, or have they been abstainers? In the hope of 
securing data bearing upon this question, Miss Grace 
M. Stafford, of the University of Oklahoma, under- 
took, at the request of the writer, to make a survey of 
general and biographical literature. She has prepared 
a brief resume of what she has found, and it is pre- 
sented in this chapter in anecdotal form, in order to 
relieve the tedium of a mere catalogue of names. At 
the conclusion of her survey she declared that “most 
of the greatest men of the past three generations were 
smokers.” In qualification of this statement it may 
be said that if a man is a great smoker the fact is far 
more likely to be mentioned in a biographical or anec- 
dotal sketch of him than if he is a non-smoker. Ab- 
stinence is a negative or neutral act which does not 
attract the attention of biographers unless in exceptional 
cases; but conspicuous indulgence cannot be overlooked. 
Further, the friends of tobacco have been industrious 
in collecting evidence to show that it not only does not 
prevent its devotees from attaining the highest distinc- 
16 HABITS OF PROMINENT MEN OF THE PAST 
17 
tion but it is an aid to achievement; while the advocates 
of abstinence have not thought of trying to show by 
compiling lists of distinguished abstainers that tobacco 
is a handicap rather than a help in intellectual endeavor. 
In this connection it may be said that A. N. 
Roe, who has been making a special investigation of 
the habits of men who have been leaders in great re- 
forms, maintains, in a letter to the writer, that most at 
least of the men who were chiefly instrumental in sup- 
pressing slavery in America were abstainers from to- 
bacco. As a result of his research he says that 
Abraham Lincoln, Horace Greeley, Wendell Phillips, 
William Lloyd Garrison, Henry Ward Beecher, and 
John Greenleaf Whittier were all non-smokers. Mr. 
Roe declares that every leader in the movement for 
woman suffrage in America was or is a non-smoker, 
and it is his view that men who use tobacco do not, 
except rarely, initiate or carry through reforms. 
Among the names of eminent men in Miss Stafford’s 
lists, the majority of whom were users of tobacco, 
there are not many who could be regarded as leaders 
in reforms affecting the welfare of the human race, 
though a few men like Washington and Gambetta are 
exceptions. 
It should be borne in mind that in any period in 
which a particular indulgence was or is fashionable and 
widespread, there will be found a large number of dis- 
tinguished and able people who practiced or practice 
the indulgence. To illustrate: during the sixteenth 
century, there was undoubtedly great laxity in sexual 18 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
relations, and many of the most prominent dignitaries 
of Church and State were what we should call 
very lax. If any one had been making a comparison 
of those who led chaste lives and those who did not, 
he could undoubtedly have mustered a splendid list of 
names for the negative side. The same was true of the 
use of liquors, especially at the end of the eighteenth 
century, when it was common for clergymen to drink 
until they rolled under the table. 
Apperson, speaking on this point, says: 
With the reign of Queen Anne, tobacco had entered 
on a period, destined to be of long duration, when 
smoking was to a very large extent under a social ban. 
Pipe-smoking was unfashionable—that is to say, was 
not practised by men of fashion, and was for the most 
part regarded as “low’’ or provincial—from the time 
named until well into the reign of Queen Victoria. The 
social taboo was by no means universal—some of the 
exceptions will be noted in these pages—but speaking 
broadly, the general, almost universal, smoking of to- 
bacco which had been characteristic of the earlier 
decades of the seventeenth century did not again pre- 
vail until within living memory.1 
And again: 
In the first two or three decades of the nineteenth 
century smoking reached its nadir. No dandy 
smoked.2 
1 “Social History of Smoking,” p. 99. 
9 Ibid., p. 131. HABITS OF PROMINENT MEN OF THE PAST 
19 
With these preliminary remarks, we may now glance 
at the practices of some of the most distinguished per- 
sons of recent times. 
In 1871, at the time of an interview between Prince 
Bismarck and Jules Favre, the Chancellor began by 
asking the French statesman if he would have a cigar. 
Favre bowed, and replied that he never smoked. 
“You are wrong,” rejoined Bismarck. “Whenever 
gentlemen begin a conversation that may sometimes 
lead to discussions and occasional violent language, it 
is much better to smoke while talking. As you smoke,” 
he continued, lighting a fine Havana, “the cigar that 
you hold and handle and do not wish to let fall par- 
alyzes somewhat the physical movements. Morally, 
without depriving us in any way of our mental facul- 
ties, it lulls us slightly. The cigar is a diversion; the 
blue smoke which mounts spirally and that you follow 
with your eyes in spite of yourself, renders you more 
conciliatory. You are happy, your sight is occupied, 
your hand is retained, and your sense of smell is satis- 
fied. You are disposed to make mutual concessions. 
Well, our work as diplomatists is made of reciprocal 
and increasing concessions. You, who do not smoke, 
have one advantage over me. You are more wide 
awake. But you have one disadvantage; you are more 
inclined to be hasty,” he said with a smile. 
A later commentator concludes this incident with the 
sentence, “Unfortunate statement this, for five minutes 
later Bismarck boiled over like a milk porridge.” 
Frederick William, King of Prussia, founded the 20 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
Tabaks-Collegium, which was a sort of smoking par- 
liament, where grave political discussions were carried 
on by the members as they puffed at their clay pipes. 
This smoking room was supplied with plenty of pipes 
and refreshments, consisting of beer, cold bread, and 
beef. 
Mazzini, the Italian exile, was forewarned that his 
assassination had been planned, and that men had been 
dispatched to London for the purpose, but he made no 
attempt to exclude them from his house. One day the 
conspirators entered his room and found him listlessly 
smoking. 
“Take cigars, gentlemen,” was his instant invitation. 
Chatting and hesitation on their part followed. 
“But you do not proceed to business, gentlemen,” 
said Mazzini; “I believe your intention is to kill me.” 
The astounded miscreants fell on their knees, and at 
length departed with the generous pardon accorded 
them, while a longer puff of smoke than usual was the 
only malediction sent after them. 
There was little smoking in Europe in the eighteenth 
century. No great man of that time was a smoker. 
During the French Revolution the pipe was compara- 
tively unknown. Neither Robespierre nor Danton, nor 
any one of the leaders of that period, was a smoker. 
But when Napoleon’s army returned from Egypt, the 
pipe became fashionable. 
Nearly all of our Presidents, from Washington, who 
was one of the leading tobacco planters and experts of HABITS OF PROMINENT MEN OF THE PAST 
21 
his time, down to the present have been users of to- 
bacco in one form or another, though there are note- 
worthy exceptions—Lincoln, Roosevelt, Taft, and 
Wilson. Practically all of the rulers of other countries 
for the past two centuries were, or are, smokers. 
Gambetta’s cigar is historic, as is Grant’s. Glad- 
stone never smoked pipe, cigar, or cigarette. However, 
his great rival, Beaconsfield, knew the pleasures of a 
cigar. The Duke of Marlborough has the credit of 
being the first distinguished man who made the chewing 
of tobacco famous. 
Frederick the Great, Dr. Johnson, George II, Na- 
poleon, Talleyrand, Metternich, Marie Antoinette, 
Gibbon, Count von Moltke, and Robert Burns were 
addicted to the use of snuff. 
In one book we read that “Cromwell disliked the 
plant, and ordered his troops to trample down the crop 
wherever found,” but in another this is said: “Crom- 
well loved his pipe and dictated his dispatches to Milton 
over sweet-smelling nicotine.” 
Raleigh is said to have smoked in his dungeon in 
the Tower while the headsman was grinding his ax. 
Napoleon detested tobacco except in the form of 
snuff. Wellington abominated it and deplored its use 
among the officers of the army. 
Lord Roberts did not smoke, but Kitchener and 
“Chinese” Gordon were “hard” smokers. 
Smoking is said to promote benevolence. The cele- 
brated German philanthropist, Father Zeller, who was 
a great smoker himself, said: “When I call upon a 22 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
man of distinction to ask a favor and I notice a pipe 
or a cigar-box on the mantelpiece, my hopes rise fifty 
per cent at once; I am almost sure of success.” The 
use of the pipe he believed to be the emblem of a cheer- 
ful, liberal disposition of mind. 
It is said of Paley, the moral philosopher, that on a 
cold winter night he was the best of companions as 
he would stir the fire and fill a long Dutch pipe. As he 
sat there, he formally declinedlany punch but still drank 
it as fast as his emptied glass was refilled. He could 
smoke any quantity of tobacco and drink any quantity 
of punch. 
Thomas Hobbes, another great philosopher, smoked 
thirteen pipes every evening up to the age of ninety-two. 
The attachment of eminent clergymen to the “weed” 
has long been well known, if not well recognized by 
partisans. 
Richard Fletcher, Bishop of London in the time of 
Elizabeth, was the first episcopal smoker in England. 
He was banished to Chelsea for marrying a second 
time and, as Camden says, “smothered his cares by the 
immoderate use of tobacco.” He died suddenly, in his 
easy chair, while smoking a pipe. 
Some years ago Mr. Spurgeon preached a sermon 
from the text: “I cried with my whole heart; hear 
me, O Lord: I will keep thy statutes. I cried unto 
thee; save me, and I shall keep thy testimonies.” He 
spoke of the necessity of giving up sin, and, at the con- 
clusion of the discourse, requested Mr. Pentecost, of HABITS OF PROMINENT MEN OF THE PAST 
23 
Boston, who was present, to give the personal appli- 
cation of the sermon. Mr. Pentecost spoke about the 
great struggle it had cost him to give up the use of 
tobacco. He said: “I liked exceedingly the best cigar 
that could be bought, but I felt that the Lord required 
me to give up smoking. So I took my cigar-box be- 
fore the Lord and cried to Him for help.” This help, 
he intimated, had been given, and the habit was re- 
nounced. Mr. Spurgeon, who was very fond of 
smoking, instantly rose at the conclusion of Mr. Pente- 
cost’s address, and, with a somewhat playful smile, 
observed that some men could do to the glory of God 
what in other men would be sin. “Notwithstanding 
what Brother Pentecost has said, I intend to smoke a 
good cigar to the glory of God before I go to bed to- 
night. If anybody can show me in the Bible the com- 
mand, ‘Thou shalt not smoke,’ I am ready to keep it; 
but I haven’t found it yet. Why, a man may think it is 
a sin to have his boots blacked. Well, then, let him give 
it up, and have them whitewashed. I am not ashamed, 
and, therefore, I mean to smoke to the glory of God.” 
This utterance created considerable excitement in 
church circles, and Mr. Spurgeon wrote a letter to the 
Daily Telegraph in which he maintained his right to 
smoke. He said: 
I will not own to sin when I am not conscious of it. 
There is growing up in society a pharisaic system, 
which adds to the commands of God the precepts of 
men; to that system I will not yield for an hour. No 
Christian should do anything in which he cannot glorify 24 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
God; and this may be done, according to Scripture, in 
eating and drinking and the common actions of life. 
When I have found intense pain relieved, a weary brain 
soothed, and calm, refreshing sleep obtained by a cigar, 
I have felt grateful to God and have blessed His name. 
Bishop Burnet always smoked while he was writing. 
In order to perform both operations comfortably he 
would have a hole made through the broad brim of his 
large hat and, putting the stem of his long pipe through 
it, he would puff as he wrote. 
Dean Aldrich, the Oxford professor, was such an 
intemperate smoke! that a student once laid a wager 
that he would be found smoking at ten o’clock in the 
morning, an early hour for him. The student went to 
the Dean’s study at the appointed hour and related the 
occasion of his visit, to which the Dean replied in per- 
fect good humor, “You see you have lost your wager, 
for I’m not smoking but filling my pipe.” He was quite 
musical and composed “A Smoking Catch, to be sung 
by four men smoking their pipes.” 
There is a long list of eminent scientists who were 
smokers. Huxley, who regretted that he did not learn 
of the solace of tobacco until some years after reach- 
ing manhood, said in his later years: “For my own 
part, I consider that tobacco, in moderation, is a 
sweetener and equalizer of the temper.” At the age 
of seventy-three, Darwin declared that nothing rested 
and soothed him more after hard work than a 
cigarette. 
Sir Isaac Newton was an inveterate smoker, and, HABITS OF PROMINENT MEN OF THE PAST 
25 
says F. W. Fairholt: “As if to show the fallacy of 
many objections to tobacco, one being that it injures 
the teeth, though he lived to a good old age, he lost but 
one tooth.” It is recorded that on one occasion, in a 
fit of mental abstraction, he used the finger of the lady 
he was courting as a tobacco stopper, as he sat and 
smoked in silence beside her. 
Richard Porson, the celebrated Greek scholar, was 
not only very fond of alcoholic stimulants, but con- 
sumed prodigious quantities of tobacco. On one of his 
orgies, which he would indulge in after weeks of un- 
remitting labor, he emptied a half-canister of snuff, 
and in one night smoked a large bundle of cigars. 
“Previous to this exhibition,” said the host who had 
entertained him, “I had always considered the powers 
of man limited.” 
It is said of the daughters of Louis XIV of France 
that they eagerly imitated English ladies of their period, 
and they were in the habit of indulging in a sort of 
orgy in their own apartments after supper. One eve- 
ning they were found in the act of drinking brandy and 
smoking pipes, which they had borrowed from the 
officers of the Swiss Guard. 
Accounts of the habits of continental writers with 
respect to the use of tobacco have not been plentiful; 
nevertheless, we read that Dumas, Victor Hugo, and 
Balzac did not smoke. Balzac declared that no good 
thing could come from the brain of any man who was 
addicted to the habit. Goethe and Heine also 
detested it. 26 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
M. Maeterlinck has hit upon an expedient whereby 
he continues to enjoy the pleasure of his pipe and at 
the same time guard against its injurious effects. 
Without the help of tobacco [a recent biographer 
writes] he seemed incapable of receiving inspiration 
or crystallizing it in words. But smoking, he noticed, 
had lost its virtue as a stimulant and instead of rousing 
the brain to activity as at first, had come to disturb its 
functions; so that now, in lieu of ordinary tobacco, he 
fills his bowl with a denicotined preparation, tasteless 
indeed, but harmless. His pipe is still always alight 
when the pen is busy, but it is hardly any more than 
an innocent subterfuge intended to cheat and so satisfy 
an irresistible mechanical craving. 
The younger Dumas, like Maeterlinck, became con- 
vinced in middle life of the injurious effects of nico- 
tine, and his conversion was brought about in dramatic 
fashion. 
It was through a newspaper article [he once told an 
interviewer] which set out so vividly the evils brought 
on by smoking that I laid down my cigar (the fifteenth 
that day, if I remember rightly) and vowed I would 
never smoke again. This vow I have rigidly kept, and 
am firmly convinced that tobacco saps the brain as 
surely as alcohol. 
Zola said that he did not believe the intelligence and 
creative strength of man were injured by smoking. 
Francois Coppee smoked cigarettes all day, but threw 
each one away after a few puffs. Taine smoked cig- HABITS OF PROMINENT MEN OF THE PAST 
27 
arettes, considering the habit a pastime in moments of 
thoughtlessness and intellectual waiting. 
George Sand (Mme. Dudevent), Alfred de Musset, 
and Eugene Sue were also among the smokers on the 
Continent of literary fame. 
The list of writers in England who were smokers 
is a long one. Among others there may be mentioned 
Gibbon, the historian; Byron, Keats, Pope, Burns, 
Coleridge, Wordsworth, Browning, Rossetti, William 
Morris, Fielding, Butler, Dryden, Goldsmith, Garrick, 
Addison, Steele, Swift, Dr. Johnson, Hogarth, Jenner, 
Sir Walter Scott, Thomas Moore, and Bulwer-Lytton. 
Southey and Ruskin hated tobacco. Ruskin heaped 
scorn on those who “pollute the pure air of morn with 
cigar smoke.” 
Cruikshank was once an inveterate smoker, .but re- 
nounced it and preached against the “weed” in his later 
years. Milton had his pipe and a glass of water just 
before he retired for the night. Buckle found it so 
imperious a necessity to have his three cigars every day 
that he said he could neither read, write, nor talk if 
compelled to forego them, or even to miss the usual 
hour for indulging in them. 
Charles Kingsley, when he was too excited to write 
any more on the book he had in hand, would calm him- 
self with a pipe. He always used a long “church- 
warden” pipe, which he used to buy, a barrelful at a 
time. When there was a vast accumulation of old 
pipes, enough to fill a barrel, they were sent back to the 28 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
kiln to be rebaked, and were returned fresh and new. 
This gave the novelist a striking simile; in “Alton 
Locke” he puts these words into the mouth of James 
Crossthwaite: “Katie here believes in purgatory, 
where souls are burned clean again, like ‘bacca pipes.’ ” 
Speaking of tobacco, another character in “Westward 
Ho” says: 
The Indians always carry it with them on their war 
parties; and no wonder, for when all things were made, 
none was made better than this, to be a lone man’s 
companion, a bachelor’s friend, a hungry man’s food, a 
sad man’s cordial, a wakeful man’s sleep, and a chilly 
man's fire, sir; while for stanching of wounds, purging 
them of rheum, and settling of the stomach, there is 
no herb like unto it under the canopy of heaven. 
One summer’s evening [writes Hone] I was walking 
on Hampstead Heath with Charles Lamb, and we had 
talked ourselves into a philosophic contempt of our 
slavery to the habit of snuff taking; and with the firm 
resolution of never again taking a single pinch, we 
threw our snuff boxes away from the hill on which we 
stood, far among the furze and brambles below, and 
went home in triumph. I began to be very miserable; 
I was wretched all night; and in the morning as I was 
walking on the same hill, I saw Charles Lamb below, 
searching among the bushes. He looked up laughing, 
and said, “What, you are come to look for your 
snuff box, too?” “Oh no,” said I, taking a pinch out 
of a paper in my waistcoat pocket, “I went for a half- 
penny worth to the first shop that was open.” 
Lamb confessed that he had been “a fierce smoker 
of tobacco.” When he decided to give up smoking, he HABITS OF PROMINENT MEN OF THE PAST 
29 
compared himself to a “volcano burned out and emit- 
ting only now and then a casual puff.” He called to- 
bacco his “loving foe,” “his friendly traitress,” the 
“great plant,” and attributed to it his chronic indispo- 
sition, which Carlyle says was really caused by his 
“insuperable proclivity to gin.” One day, while he 
was puffing away at the strongest and coarsest prep- 
aration of the “weed” in company with Dr. Parr, who 
could smoke only the finest sorts of tobacco, Parr asked 
Lamb how he had acquired such “prodigious power” 
as a smoker. “I toiled after it,” replied the humorist, 
with his habit*ual stutter, “as some men t-t-toil after 
virtue.” He once expressed a wish to John Foster that 
his last breath might be drawn through a pipe and ex- 
haled in a pun. He wrote to Coleridge in 1803 : 
What do you think of smoking? I want your sober, 
average, noon opinion of it. I generally am eating 
dinner about the time I should determine it. Morning 
is a girl, and can’t smoke—she’s no evidence one way 
or the other; and Night is so evidently bought over, 
he can’t be a very upright judge. Maybe the truth is 
that one pipe is wholesome, two pipes toothsome, three 
pipes noisome, four pipes fulsome, five pipes quarrel- 
some, and that’s the sum on’t. But that is deciding 
rather upon rhyme than reason. . . . After all, our 
instincts may be best. 
There is a legend to the effect that on the one eve- 
ning passed at Craigenputtock by Emerson, in 1833, 
Carlyle gave him a pipe, and, taking one himself, the 
two sat silent till midnight, and then parted, shaking 30 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
hands, with congratulations on the profitable and pleas- 
ant evening they had enjoyed. Carlyle once said that 
tobacco smoke is good, because it allows men to sit 
silent together without embarrassment. When a man 
has said what he has got to say, he can hold his peace 
and take to his pipe. He maintained that such a prac- 
tice could be wisely introduced into parliaments, where 
there should be a minimum of speech and the soothing 
and clarifying influence of tobacco smoke. 
Dickens was a smoker, and we catch a glimpse of 
him smoking a farewell cigar with Thackeray at 
Boulogne. There they conversed about a certain titled 
lady, a singular character, who had made Dickens 
smoke with her some cigars made of negro-head, 
powerful enough, according to his account, to “quell 
an elephant in six whiffs.” Thackeray, as the satirist 
of those who opposed smoking, was naturally an invet- 
erate smoker himself. He called the cigar, “the great- 
est creature-comfort of his life, a kind companion, 
a gentle stimulant, an amiable anodyne, a cementer of 
friendship.” He always said that the man who smokes 
has a great advantage in conversation. 
You may stop talking if you like, but the breaks of 
silence never seem disagreeable, being filled up by the 
puffing of the smoke; hence there is no awkwardness 
in resuming the conversation, no straining for effect, 
sentiments are delivered in a grave, easy manner. The 
cigar harmonizes society, and soothes at once the 
speaker and the subject whereon he converses. I have 
no doubt that it is from the habit of smoking that HABITS OF PROMINENT MEN OF THE PAST 
31 
Turks and American Indians are such monstrous well- 
bred men. 
Tennyson’s devotion to his pipe is widely known, but 
the following story may be fresh to most readers. A 
friend had driven him to Plymouth to visit an old 
woman who stood in no awe of the poet. The visitors 
were invited to remain for the night, but on Mr. Ten- 
nyson’s stipulating that if he did he should be allowed 
to smoke in his bedroom, the old woman became angry. 
That, she could not allow. Bedroom smoking was not 
only objectionable, but dangerous, and for no one 
would she relax her rule. Mr. Tennyson proved equally 
obdurate, and the hostess’s own carriage was ordered 
out to take him back to his hotel at Plymouth, but he 
returned the next morning to breakfast. He used 
Virginia tobacco, preferred a pipe, the common clay 
being his choice, but he had a great many kinds of 
pipes, mostly presents from admirers and friends. 
When smoking with his friends in his den, he sat with 
a box full of clay pipes at his feet. Filling one of 
these, he smoked until it was empty, broke it in two, 
and threw the fragments into another box prepared for 
their reception. Then he pulled another pipe from its 
straw or wooden enclosure, filled it, lighted it, and de- 
stroyed it as before. 
Earl Russell was once questioning Tennyson about 
his visit at Venice. After the poet had said he had 
seen the Bridge of Sighs, the pictures, and all the 
wonderful things in the city, the Earl was very much 
surprised to hear him say he didn’t like Venice. 32 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
“How? Indeed? Why not, Mr. Tennyson?” 
“They had no good cigars there, my lord; and I left 
the place in disgust.” 
George Meredith declares tobacco to be “man’s 
friend, his consolation, his comfort, his refuge at night, 
his first thought in the morning.” 
Swinburne detested it, and expressed himself on the 
subject with characteristic extravagance and vehe- 
mence : “James I was a knave, a tyrant, a fool, a liar, 
a coward. But I love him, I worship him, because he 
slit the throat of the blackguard Raleigh who invented 
this filthy smoking.” 
Ralph Waldo Emerson says: 
The believing we do something when we do nothing 
is the first illusion of tobacco.1 
Robert Louis Stevenson dictated his works between 
puffs of a cigarette. He declared that if his doctor 
told him that smoking would kill him, he should con- 
tinue to smoke, since he would have to die some time, 
and he was certain that nothing could bring death more 
pleasantly than tobacco. 
Hawthorne smoked, and, discussing the philosophy 
of tobacco, awarded the highest honors to the pipe. 
Mark Twain adopted the principle of never smoking 
when asleep or at meals, and never refraining at any 
other time. 
Oliver Wendell Holmes called himself a tobaccona- 
lian. “Really,” he said once, “I must not smoke so 
1 “Journals,” IX, p. 251. HABITS OF PROMINENT MEN OF THE PAST 
33 
persistently; I must turn over a new leaf—a tobacco 
leaf—and have a cigar only after each”—and he paused 
as if to say “meal,” but continued, “after each cigar.” 
But later on, Holmes took a different view of the effects 
of tobacco upon the human system, for he says: 
What do I say to smoking ? I cannot grudge an old 
man his pipe, but I think tobacco often does a great 
deal of harm to the health—to the eyes especially, to 
the nervous system generally, producing headache, pal- 
pitation, and trembling. I myself gave it up many 
years ago. Philosophically speaking, I think self-nar- 
cotization and self-alcoholization are rather ignoble 
substitutes for undisturbed self.1 
Other quotations of similar character may be found 
in “Medical Essays,” 1883, page 385; and “The Auto- 
crat,” page 102. 
Sir Robert Baden Powell was opposed to smoking, 
according to the School Physiology Journal.2 
Roosevelt’s physicians, Drs. Murphy, Bevan, and 
Terrell, said on October 16, 1912, “We find him in 
magnificent physical condition due to his regular phys- 
ical exercise, and his habitual abstinence from tobacco 
and liquor.” 
Apperson mentions the following, since the six- 
teenth century, whose practices have not been referred 
to in preceding paragraphs, who did'not use tobacco: 
Robert Burton (“A plague, a mischief, a violent 
'“Over the Teacups,” p. 184. 
3 April, 1909, p. 122. 34 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
purger of goods, lands, health, hellish, devilish, 
and damned tobacco, the ruin and overthrow of 
body and soul”). 
King Charles I. 
George Fox. 
William Penn. 
Jonathan Swift (occasionally used snuff). 
Samuel Johnson. 
William Cowper (occasionally used snuff). 
Prince Consort Albert. 
Meta Lander adds the following to Apperson’s list: 
President Edward Hitchcock, of Amherst. 
Dr. Allibone. 
The Duke of Argyle. 
Robert and William Chambers. 
George W. Childs. 
Professor Fairbairn. 
Cardinal Newman. 
Keshub Chunder Sen. 
M. Barthelemy St. Hilaire. 
Ernst Haeckel. 
Philip Gilbert Hamerton. 
Charles Reade. 
President Hopkins, of Williams College. 
Lord Bacon. 
John G. Whittier. CHAPTER III 
TESTIMONIES OF MEN AND WOMEN OF DISTINCTION 
Does the use of tobacco handicap or does it help men 
and women engaged in intellectual pursuits? It 
should be possible to secure data of interest and of 
some value relating to this question if the practice of 
intellectually superior people could be ascertained. 
What do those who have attained distinction in activi- 
ties demanding mental efficiency and who use, or have 
used, tobacco think of its influence upon their own intel- 
lectual processes? If such persons would testify, 
their testimonies should be entitled to consideration, 
even if they should prove to be of only slight scien- 
tific worth. Again, are those who are charged with the 
responsibility of employing men for important mis- 
sions requiring mental poise and acumen influenced for 
or against a man if he uses tobacco or if he does not 
use it? If one could secure accurate information bear- 
ing upon this question it should prove of considerable 
worth, since a man’s belief regarding the effect of to- 
bacco on efficiency is put to the test when he is required 
to engage men for responsible positions. 
In the hope of obtaining answers to these questions, 
it was decided to make an appeal to persons of distinc- 
tion to furnish the information desired. Approxi- 
mately thirty-five leading men in each of the following 
35 36 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
groups were asked to state their experience with 
tobacco: 
Group I. Physicians, hygienists, physical edu- 
cationists. 
Group II. University presidents and deans. 
Group III. Psychologists. 
Group IV. Scientists, physical and biological. 
Group V. Literary men, artists, musicians. 
Group VI. Presidents, congressmen, cabinet offi- 
cers, and diplomats. 
Group VII. Judges and lawyers. 
Group VIII. School superintendents. 
Group IX. Financiers and “captains of industry.” 
Group X. Military and naval officers and en- 
gineers. 
It was decided to request information only from 
men who had attained noteworthy success in the 
fields indicated. ' A list of from fifty to sixty men in 
each field, and sixty women in Group V, was first pre- 
pared by the writer and his assistants in consultation 
with one or more specialists in each field in the Univer- 
sity of Wisconsin or elsewhere. These lists were then 
worked over in order to secure about thirty-five persons 
in each group who were universally regarded as having 
attained a commanding position through actual achieve- 
ment of a high order. No one was included in the final 
lists who had not won attention through accomplish- 
ments which lifted him very distinctly above the ma- 
jority of his co-workers. 
The following personal letter was written to each of 
these three hundred and seventy distinguished persons: TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
37 
I come to you seeking your cooperation in an in- 
vestigation I am conducting in conjunction with a 
group of men working in the psychological, medical, 
and sociological sciences to determine, if possible, the 
influence of tobacco on the intellectual processes. This 
investigation is being conducted solely with a view 
to securing accurate, unbiased data regarding the 
effect of tobacco on the human mind. For a number 
of months experimental work has been in progress in 
the psychological laboratories of the University of 
Wisconsin under the direction of Dr. Hull, and this 
work will be continued for many months to come. In 
addition to the laboratory studies, I have secured the 
cooperation of a large number of high-school principals 
and faculties in the study of the effect of tobacco on the 
intellectual work and the deportment of high-school 
pupils. I wish now to secure testimony from men who 
have achieved noteworthy success in various lines of ac- 
tivity regarding their views of the relation of tobacco 
to mental efficiency. 
I trust you will state whether, if you use tobacco, 
you are able to tell if it has a or harmful or 
neutral effect upon your own mental processes. Will 
you state how early you began its use and to what 
extent you indulged in it in earlier as well as in later 
years? If you have once used it but have given it up, 
will you state the reasons why you have abandoned it ? 
In engaging men for service of any sort do you take 
into account whether or not they indulge in tobacco? 
Have you found that those who do not use it in any 
form are more or are bev less efficient than those 
who do use it? 
Thirty-eight per cent of those who received the let- 
ter responded to it, some of them quite fully. A 38 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
number of the letters, however, were apparently writ- 
ten in haste and some of them in prejudice. Seven 
of the men thought the purpose of the investigation 
was to secure data for an anti-tobacco crusade, and 
they did not want to be used as exhibits for or against 
tobacco. A considerable number of the men who re- 
sponded seemingly did not give serious attention to 
the problems which were presented to them. A few 
of this number were smokers and said in a sentence 
or two that they enjoyed their tobacco and were not 
aware that it had any harmful effect on them. Some 
of them were non-smokers and said they believed 
tobacco was harmful. Letters of this kind that bore 
evidence of hasty, ill-considered responses were dis- 
carded in working over the returns. An equal number 
of smokers and of non-smokers was eliminated. After 
the elimination of letters written in haste and appar- 
ently in prejudice, there were one hundred fifty-six 
left, eighty of which were written by smokers and 
seventy-six by non-smokers. There was no marked 
difference in the number of smokers and of non- 
smokers in any of the groups, except in the groups 
of writers of fiction and essays, and the financiers. 
Every man in the first group and all but two in the 
second use tobacco and some of them say they “smoke 
all the time.” Most of the women in the literary 
group smoke. It was a surprise to the writer to learn 
that fifty-five per cent of the congressmen who re- 
sponded were non-smokers, since there is a popular 
belief that all persons engaged in political life use to- TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
39 
bacco. It was a surprise, too, to learn that sixty per 
cent of school superintendents indulge in tobacco and a 
still larger per cent of university presidents and deans 
gain comfort from it. 
The majority of those who use tobacco say that 
they smoke “moderately.” Only a few, mainly writers 
and psychologists, say that they smoke “a good deal” 
or “constantly” or “all the time,” and they are evidently 
pleased that they can do so without apparent harm. 
The “moderate” smokers say that they smoke a cigar 
or pipe after breakfast, another after luncheon, and 
three or four after dinner; or they smoke two or three 
cigarettes after breakfast, a half-dozen after luncheon, 
and eight or ten at night. Two men say they smoke 
“moderately”—from ten to fifteen cigars daily. A 
number of the women smoke continuously when they 
are planning or writing a book. The general impres- 
sion made upon the writer is that smokers indulge 
themselves generously, though, as a rule, they say 
they are quite restrained. One of the most important 
financiers in this country states that “ninety-five per 
cent of the leaders in banking and finance use tobacco 
‘constantly.’ ” 
Three men began smoking at the age of nine. One 
of them, who is perhaps the leading writer of fiction 
in our country, states that he began smoking ciga- 
rettes at nine and has smoked “incessantly” from that 
time to the present. He can make no headway in any 
intellectual work without tobacco. A college president 40 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
began at fifteen and has smoked “constantly” since 
that time. A composer and band leader began at 
seventeen and has smoked “furiously” ever since. One 
of the leading surgeons in America began at twenty 
and has smoked from six to eight cigars daily for many 
years. A leading statesman who played a very prom- 
inent role in the World War began smoking at 
eighteen and has smoked “excessively” for forty 
years. 1> should be noted, however, that all except a 
very few smokers state that they think tobacco is harm- 
ful to immature persons, and they would advise boys 
not to begin smoking until they have attained maturity. 
The majority of the smokers began after they com- 
pleted the teens, while some of them did not begin until 
they were past thirty. One university president who 
now is rarely without a cigar no matter where he is or 
what he is doing, and who states that if he could have 
his way he would teach every man over forty to smoke 
for health and pleasure, began smoking at forty-three. 
Very few of those who smoke admit that tobacco is 
detrimental either to health or to mental efficiency. A 
majority of them state that they derive comfort and 
solace from tobacco and are able to do more intellectual 
work with than without its use. They say frequently 
that tobacco steadies the nerves and improves judg- 
ment. One statesman who for a number of years has 
been obliged to choose men for difficult missions states 
that when he is selecting a man for an important un- 
dertaking, he tries to find one who smokes, because he TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
41 
has “greater confidence in the sanity of his judgment.” 
Another man, an experimental biologist of great re- 
nown, says that he cannot trust a man who smokes 
with any task requiring intellectual acumen. Accord- 
ing to his experience, smokers may be able to perform 
coarse muscular tasks, but they are always deficient 
intellectually in his field. 
The non-smokers are, with very few exceptions, quite 
reserved in their expressions regarding their observa- 
tions respecting the effect of tobacco upon their asso- 
ciates and the men in their employ. 'Nine men who were 
once smokers have abandoned the use of tobacco be- 
cause they believe it is harmful either to their health or 
to their intellectual efficiency. All but four of the non- 
smokers state that in employing men for responsible 
positions they do not discriminate against those who 
smoke unless they are known to indulge excessively. 
In addition to the views of the experimental biologist 
mentioned above, a director of an advertising agency 
who employs a large number of men to do creative 
work states that smokers are always deficient in creative 
ability. Contrasted with this view is the testimony of 
a distinguished writer of fiction, who has a number of 
widely known books to his credit, that he does not 
know any writer of consequence who does not do his 
work “under the influence of nicotine”; and a president 
of a large university says that the men who use tobacco 
in his institution are superior to those who do not use it. 
Several typical letters from persons in each group 
are reproduced below. Each letter was written by one 42 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
who has achieved high distinction for actual achieve- 
ment in his special field. All names are withheld, since 
many of the testimonies were given to the writer in 
confidence. 
Group I 
Physicians, Hygienists, Physical Educationists 
Author A: “I have smoked tobacco in the form 
of cigarettes, cigars, and pipe since I was about twenty 
years of age. I have never used it excessively and 
usually I have not smoked until after the luncheon 
hour. I still use it at sixty-five years of age. On two 
occasions I ceased to use it for several months, for no 
other reason than to test my ability to overcome the 
habit. This I did without any special inconvenience. 
I returned to its use, first, because I enjoyed it, and 
second, because I believe it aided me in intellectual 
effort. It has appeared to me to act upon me as a 
mental tonic or stimulant. I have always worked hard 
and for many hours every day. The character of my 
professional work as a practitioner of medicine, as a 
hospital attendant, and as a medical teacher so occupies 
the hours of the day that I have been obliged to do my 
reading at night. For many years as a student and 
as a doctor, I have read not less than two hours every 
night with, of course, exceptions when out of the city 
on consultation work. It is during these night hours 
that I have smoked most. Often when physically and 
mentally fatigued, a few minutes with a pipe has ap- TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
43 
parently so relieved me that I have been able to read 
and write without any sense of fatigue for a long 
period of time. This I believe to be due to the fact 
that tobacco smoked in moderate doses contracts the 
small arteries by stimulating the vasoconstrictor nerves 
and the unstriped muscle in the vessel walls. This 
results in a slight rise of blood pressure and a more 
active arterial circulation. Tobacco has the same ef- 
fect upon the unstriped muscle of the gastro-intestinal 
tract. This slight contraction of the smaller blood 
vessels and increased blood pressure continues for a 
considerable period of time and is, therefore, a tonic 
rather than a stimulant effect. 
“On the other hand, carried beyond the physiologic 
effect the toxic effect of tobacco when overused is ap- 
parently the direct opposite, inasmuch as it seems to 
have a depressing effect upon the vasoconstrictor cen- 
ters and nerves with resulting lower blood pressure, 
nausea, general relaxation, and the opposite of stimu- 
lation or of tonic effect. 
“The statement I have made concerning the tonic 
effect of tobacco, the stimulation of the vasoconstrictor 
nerves and of the unstriped muscular fiber, is based 
upon clinical observation and also upon animal experi- 
mentation. 
“I have always believed that tobacco used in any 
form is harmful to the growing human animal. It is 
harmful in its effects, too, upon adults who have cer- 
tain degenerative changes in heart muscle or in the 
blood vessels. 44 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
“It has been my fortune to be closely associated as a 
physician with some of the biggest and most construc- 
tive men in the industrial world. Among these were 
[here is given a list of six leaders in industry—M. V. 
O’S.], and many others who smoked, not excessively, 
but every day. In all of these men as they reached 
relative old age, changes occurred in the tissues, par- 
ticularly of the heart and blood vessels, which made it 
necessary to cut out the tobacco altogether or to limit 
its use to the minimum amount. All of them were men 
of strong character and easily overcame the habit when 
that was necessary. Nevertheless, each one presented 
conditions of irritability of temper and more or less 
inconstancy as to continued concentration of intellec- 
tual effort which each one attributed to the deprivation 
of the soothing effect of tobacco.” 
Author B: “I used tobacco but once and that is 
over a half a century ago. It had a most deadly effect 
upon me and I have never used it since. 
“There is one question, however, that I can answer, 
namely, regarding the employment of men for service. 
I make it a point not to give appointments to assistants 
who are addicted to the use of cigarettes, because I do 
not consider it worth my time to train such men; be- 
cause it has been my observation that in my especial 
line of work men who smoke cigarettes lose their effi- 
ciency about the time of life when according to natural 
conditions the opportunity for doing efficient work is 
greatest, namely, about the age of fifty years.” ✓- TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
45 
Author C: “I began to use tobacco when a fresh- 
man in college, and I have used it steadily ever since. 
I have always, however, been rather moderate in my 
use of it. For a good many years now I rarely smoke 
more than two pipes and one cigar a day. To the best 
of my knowledge and belief it has never had any effect 
whatever on my intellectual process, either temporarily 
or permanently. It has been, and is, however, a source 
of great enjoyment to me, and I should be extremely 
sorry to be obliged to give it up. I think that I should 
be rather more inclined to engage a man who used to- 
bacco than one who did not, because I should feel there 
was something queer about a man who did not use it.” 
Author D: “I used tobacco, more or less clan- 
destinely, as a boy, though I never became addicted to 
the habit. I began using tobacco and formed the habit 
when I was about thirty years old and I have continued 
its use since, and I am now sixty-eight. I think it is 
altogether a habit and that the moderate use of tobacco 
has no influence one way or another on physical con- 
dition or mental processes.” 
Author E: “I have never noticed any particular 
effects one way or another upon mental processes, 
except that when nervous or overstimulated I find it 
an agreeable sedative. I began smoking at about 
fifteen, but have been an extremely moderate smoker. 
Recently I have used it somewhat more than before. I 
have never observed that tobacco has any effect on 
men as regards their mental capacity, beyond the usual 46 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
observation that there are few men of much capacity 
who do not smoke more or less. Also that there are 
very few men of low capacity that do not smoke more 
or less.” 
Author F: “I have smoked cigars rather immod- 
erately for many years. I began smoking after my 
twentieth year, at first moderately, and in later years I 
have smoked probably six or eight cigars daily on the 
average. I have not observed any detrimental effect 
mentally or physically, and, having acquired a tolerance 
to the use of tobacco, my sense of well-being is rather 
dependent upon its continuance. 
“There are doubtless such marked individual differ- 
ences in susceptibility to the effects of tobacco that my 
experience or that of any single individual is not a safe 
basis for generalization. Doubtless some are injured 
and others not by the use of tobacco. It is largely a 
question of tolerance. I should not favor any one 
acquiring the habit, although personally I derive much 
comfort from it. . . . Those who do not use tobacco 
include some who are constitutionally inferior and have 
discovered by experience that they cannot stand the use 
of tobacco. Of course they are better off without it.” 
Author G: “My experience with the effect of 
tobacco upon my own personal mental action would 
seem to indicate that it has no special effect upon 
mental processes. It is true that I did not begin the 
use of tobacco until I was nearly thirty years old, and 
have since used it continuously for more than forty TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
47 
years but never to any excess. I have never been able 
to perceive that it accelerated or retarded my mental 
activities. I have only smoked the weed in the form 
of fairly good cigars. I have had no experience with 
cigarettes or chewing. 
“I have never relinquished the use of it because I 
have always derived a certain degree of mental comfort 
from its use. . . . 
“Some of the best and most active mental workers 
in my experience have used tobacco to excess, and 
doubtless have become accustomed to it as a stimulant 
to mental activity. 
“In engaging men for service of any sort I have 
never discriminated against the users of tobacco, nor 
have I found that men who did not use it were any 
happier or more useful as employees. Personally, I 
ought to add that I have never smoked more than from 
one to three cigars daily and usually in the latter part 
of the day after my most trying mental work was com- 
pleted.” 
Author H: “I have smoked since I was twenty- 
five and I am now sixty. I smoke cigarettes and in- 
hale. I smoke five to ten a day. I am dependent on it 
and have never stopped for any great length of time. 
I think that on the whole I would have been better 
never to have smoked, first, because I have the tobacco 
habit; second, if I smoke much my appetite is not as 
good, and I am sure that it impairs my appetite. 
“I need tobacco most in periods of mental stress. In 48 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
writing I feel a great desire to smoke and I think it 
quiets me, and making me easier, I think that I write 
better for it. Playing cards I want very much to smoke 
more than usual. In periods of mental anxiety I feel 
the steadying effect of tobacco. If I smoke too much it 
impairs my sleep and makes me nervous, but I have 
never thought that in any way it dulled or slowed my 
mental processes. Mentally, I have simply had com- 
fort, and, I have thought, greater efficiency from its use. 
“I have not regarded it as a factor in selecting 
assistants and my impression is that most of the suc- 
cessful men I know are moderate smokers and some 
excessive smokers.” 
Author I: “I believe that the influence of tobacco 
must first be worked out on sympathicotonic and vago- 
tonic states. These two physiological opposites respond 
quite diversely to nicotine, the influence being chiefly 
through the vegetative system, producing thereby a 
very widespread series of modifications in all the phy- 
siological processes. ... So far as my own testimony 
is concerned, the situation is very variable and depend- 
ent upon a great many factors, particularly the nature 
of the work to be accomplished and the time when it is 
attempted. I think there are some very far-reaching 
psychological deductions to be drawn with reference to 
introverting factors, especially with those who inhale 
and who utilize the respiratory titillation for intro- 
verted erotic satisfaction. Whether an inhaler does 
this or not is always a question of fact which can be TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
49 
determined only by psychoanalytic investigation, since 
different people inhale for many different reasons.” 
Author J: “I have very little by way of personal 
experience I can give you, but I have been a careful 
observer, all these years, of its effects upon my patients 
and have made a number of physiological and psycho- 
logical experiments. 
“i. Tobacco, as I have observed its effect upon peo- 
ple, differs greatly with different individuals. 
“2. I have noticed especially unfavorable results in 
young people—say before twenty-one, and in certain 
older individuals—after forty-five or fifty. Many per- 
sons seem to tolerate a moderate amount pretty well 
between twenty-five and forty. 
“3. There seems to be a certain stimulating effect, 
in the early stages, of a moderate amount in the case 
of some individuals. I know, of course, that the ulti- 
mate effect is one of narcotization, but to my own mind 
I have explained the early invigorating or stimulating 
effect of tobacco by the fact that it temporarily raises 
blood pressure, in the majority of people—that is, when 
it is not habitually used to excess, and I have laid the 
apparent subjective beneficial effects to this slight initial 
rise in blood pressure. 
“4. I am coming more and more to take it entirely 
away from my neurasthenic, high-strung patients. I 
think they, as a group, should cut it out—not merely 
cut it down. 
“5. I find that in certain cases of nervous indiges- 50 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
tion or so-called dyspepsia, we are not able to bring 
about a cure so long as they continue to use tobacco. 
“6. I have come, in later years, very definitely to 
associate the use of tobacco and alcohol. I find, in 
treating chronic alcoholism, that it has been necessary 
to stop the use of tobacco. I think it was more than 
just one narcotic calling for another, etc. I think that 
in these pathologic individuals the nicotine unduly 
raised the blood pressure and the alcohol—for the time 
being—lowered it, and therefore gave relief to the 
feeling of overtension following the use of tobacco. 
“7. I have a long list of young men running through 
my mind, whose efficiency, health, and progress were 
greatly improved and accelerated by either cutting down 
their tobacco or by abandoning its use altogether. 
These impressions are so numerous and so vivid upon 
my mind that they amount to a strong conviction—a 
very positive opinion—that tobacco, in very large 
amounts at any rate, does lessen the actual efficiency and 
interfere with the intellectual and physiological proc- 
esses, though I can readily appreciate that in small 
amounts, in certain individuals, it might serve as a 
temporary stimulant or as a mild narcotic to soothe 
the nerves and smooth the path of life. 
“My own attitude toward it is one entirely neutral. 
I used it a very short time as a young man; took it up 
for no purpose that I can recall and gave it up for no 
particular reason. In fact, tobacco has no charms for 
me. I will sit in a banquet or lecture room, laden with 
tobacco smoke. It is never disagreeable and never TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
51 
affects me, except, when it is too strong, after a long 
address I find my throat to be dry and more or less 
inflamed.” 
Group II 
University Presidents and Deans 
Author A: “I never used tobacco in any form (I 
could not for it made me sick) until at the age of forty- 
three I was half ill in Russia for three months with 
an intestinal catarrh which a number of physicians 
could not cure. In Moscow an old German doctor ad- 
vised smoking as a cure. I told him I could not smoke 
without nausea, even a cigarette, but he brought and 
insisted on my smoking a whole large cigar. This I 
did slowly and with no ill effect, and then wanted an- 
other. It seemed to me to have an almost magic effect 
in curing my trouble. Since then I have always smoked, 
generally one cigar after the midday and evening meal, 
and sometimes two or three. My digestion has ever 
since been distinctly better, and I have had none of the 
dyspepsia that so often befell me before. I have, sev- 
eral times, left it off for a few days or weeks to see if 
I could, and I had no craving; but the days seemed 
much longer than usual and my mental edge seemed 
dulled. 
“Since I began to smoke I have done a great deal of 
writing, which is, on the whole, my hardest intellectual 
work, and through nearly all of it I keep a cigar from 
going out. The doctors tell me I have no sign of ? 52 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
tobacco heart and advise me to keep on smoking, which 
I shall certainly do unless these half-sexed reformers 
take away my tobacco, as they have my equally stimu- 
lating but always very moderately used alcoholic drinks. 
“Young people, before and during the best age of 
parenthood, should not touch tobacco, for it is just as 
bad for the phylum as it is helpful for the individual. 
The man of fifty or sixty, however, who has not 
learned to use and enjoy tobacco, at least in a mild, 
reasonable form, has missed one of the greatest pleas- 
ures and stimulants to vigor, longevity, and efficient 
work that the earth can afford. I think of organizing 
a propaganda for its use among all senescent and 
presenescent people.” 
Author B: “I never smoked regularly until I was 
about twenty-eight or twenty-nine years of age, though 
I smoked with a certain irregularity while I was in 
college (seventeen to twenty-one). Within the last 
twenty years I have not smoked in the forenoon, and, 
as a general thing, only one or two cigars after dinner 
in the evening. I have sometimes gone without smok- 
ing for several days at a time. This was done rather 
to test my strength as against the habit than because I 
suffered any ill effects. I have not noticed that the 
use of tobacco lessened any man’s efficiency. I think 
that the use of tobacco involves very little difference 
one way or another, especially if that use be moderate. 
I may be, however, misled by the fact that men who 
have unusual ‘go’ in them and force and vitality are TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
53 
rather inclined to be smokers. Here at the University, 
for instance, it looks as if the men who smoked were 
the abler men. I should not, however, think of attrib- 
uting this superior ability to the use of tobacco, but 
there may be some who do. I am sure, however, it 
makes little difference as far as health is concerned. 
My physician, whom I have had now for twenty years 
and who is a Professor of Medicine in the University, 
does not smoke himself, but tells me that in my own 
case it would make little or no difference whether I 
smoked or not. 
“You ask whether on giving up the use of tobacco I 
noticed any difference, and I can say that more than 
once I have given up the use of tobacco for several 
continuous days and have noted no difference that 
could be reported.” 
Author C: “I began to smoke at the early age of 
fifteen years when I worked in a rolling mill. I have 
smoked ever since without, as it seems to me, harmful 
effects, except when I did not clean the nicotine out of 
my pipe. 
“When we engage men for service we do not take 
account of whether or not they indulge in tobacco. I 
may say that I spent the other afternoon in company 
with [Here is given a list of six of the most noteworthy 
scientists in America—M. V. O'S.]. Every man pres- 
ent smoked furiously the whole afternoon. It seems to 
me that there can be no doubt whatever that tobacco is 
an agreeable, and perhaps even a useful, ingredient in 54 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
the daily life of man. That at least is my conviction 
concerning it.” 
Author D: “I began to use tobacco when I was 
eighteen years old. I do not think I smoked much 
until I was twenty-five or twenty-six. I now limit 
myself to buying two cigars a day, but if by chance I 
have a larger number at hand, I invariably smoke them 
all, at least up to twelve or fifteen. I have a general 
impression that smoking slows up the mental processes. 
When I am smoking I find it harder to begin work. 
On the contrary, if I have been writing for two or three 
hours, and have become excited, I find that a cigar 
brings me back to a more even and normal procedure. 
I have never used the tobacco test in employing men, 
nor have I observed that abstainers are more efficient 
than smokers.” 
Author E: “I began smoking, chiefly cigarettes, 
when I was twenty, and have smoked regularly for 
above twenty-three years. In the first few years I 
smoked probably ten cigarettes a day, gradually in- 
creasing until now on some days I smoke forty. Note 
this, however, I never inhale smoke, a fact which doc- 
tors tell me makes an enormous amount of difference. 
“I don’t find that smoking affects my mental proc- 
esses. It is a nervous habit, like tapping a desk with 
a pencil; of no value, but very difficult now to over- 
come. When I think of the great pleasure it has given 
me for nearly a quarter of a century, however, I can- 
not be too thankful that I took it up. TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
55 
“I never yet asked a man whether or not he smoked. 
I do not believe that smoking in reason affects effi- 
ciency; but from the hedonistic viewpoint, I am sorry 
for anybody, man or woman, who doesn’t smoke.” 
Author F: “My use of tobacco is very irregular 
and slight and I cannot learn that it has had any ma- 
terial effect on my own mental processes. Perhaps 
those processes would be more effective if I had never 
occasionally indulged in a cigar. I have never formed 
the habit and have therefore never given up the habit. 
“In engaging men for the University the question to 
which you refer has never been taken into account. I 
have not yet found any difference in the effectiveness 
of men who do use tobacco and others who do not.” 
Author G: “I don’t remember just when I ac- 
quired the habit, but I know it was something over 
fifty years ago. I should say about fifty-five years ago. 
I am not aware that the use of tobacco injuriously 
affects my mental processes unless it be used to excess. 
Excessive use of food produces the same result. I am 
very sure that for certain kinds of mental work tobacco 
is an aid rather than a deterrent of mental activity. I 
have never given it up except on one or two occasions 
when I have been sick for a few days and didn’t care 
for it. 
“I do not take into account whether men whom I 
engage use tobacco or not. I have men on my faculty 
who use tobacco, and others who do not. I see nothing 56 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
which indicates that the use of tobacco injuriously 
affects them. I think there is a likelihood of young 
people’s using tobacco to excess, just as they may use 
other things to excess. I think that is unfortunate. 
Probably they would be better off if they had not ever 
used it, because there would not have been any induce- 
ment to its excessive use, or use in any way. I am not 
sure, however, that the excess might not have appeared 
somewhere else.” 
Author H: “My own smoking—then confined 
chiefly to cigarettes—began when I was seventeen. I 
smoked because I considered it a rather fine and manly 
thing to do, but acquired no taste for smoking. A 
few months later I quit, partly through waning en- 
thusiasm, and partly because I was more or less in- 
fluenced by a local anti-tobacco crusade. 
“When I was forty I began to smoke again—after 
an abstinence of about twenty-two years. The smok- 
ing of this period was irregular, chiefly social, and 
exceedingly moderate. The effect was negligible. 
“Ten years ago—I am now fifty-six years of age—I 
began to smoke more regularly, and the practice as 
then established has continued until the present time, 
and, so far as I can foresee, is likely to be continued. 
Sometimes for a week or two at a time I do not smoke 
at all, and my average would not exceed a cigar a day 
throughout the calendar year. I do not smoke a pipe 
and never use cigarettes. 
“I cannot discover any effect whatever upon mental TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
57 
efficiency. But my chief reason for continuing the 
practice, apart from enjoyment of a good cigar, is that 
tobacco in the form and quantity in which I use it is 
for me a distinct sedative. After addressing an audi- 
ence at night and at a time when I am necessarily 
excited and ‘keyed up,’ a smoke is undoubtedly bene- 
ficial to me. It quiets my nerves and, I suspect, com- 
poses me for sleep an hour earlier than would other- 
wise be the case. On nights when for any reason I 
do not smoke after meeting an audience I am likely 
to suffer from prolonged wakefulness.” 
Group III 
Psychologists 
Author A: “I began to smoke tobacco at the age 
of twenty and have smoked a good deal from the age 
of twenty-two up to the present time. I have never 
given it up. In engaging employees or recommending 
men for service I have never paid any attention to 
whether or not they are smokers. I do not know any- 
thing by direct experience concerning the difference in 
efficiency between those who smoke and those who do 
not, or in the same man when he is smoking compared 
with a period when he has given it up. I am unable 
to say whether its use has been beneficial to me per- 
sonally or not. 
“It is my general impression that both the alleged 
enjoyments and the alleged deleterious effects of to- 
bacco have been largely exaggerated.” 58 
OBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
Author B: “It seems to me inevitable that the 
constant doping of the higher brain centers by means 
of any narcotic, and this includes tobacco and alcohol, 
must have a degenerating effect upon the race in the 
long run. As long as this is confined to one sex, the 
influence is constantly counteracted, but when women 
begin to smoke we may expect serious racial degenera- 
tion. I cannot see how it could be otherwise. 
“In reference to your specific inquiries, I do not use 
tobacco in any form. I began smoking when I was 
twenty-eight years of age and used it very moderately 
for about six years, gradually giving it up, more from 
inertia than from principle. I noticed no peculiar ef- 
fects either way, except that one cigar increased the 
beating of my heart very much. Mentally, it seemed 
neither to soothe me nor to enable me to do any better 
work. It simply seemed to be rather exciting and I 
thought for that reason the effect was bad.” 
Author C: “I began to smoke when I was about 
seventeen or eighteen years of age, and I have con- 
tinued the practice, somewhat irregularly, until very 
recently. I do not think I have ever been an excessive 
smoker, except perhaps during a brief period of my 
life when I was a newspaper reporter. The physiologi- 
cal effect has always been of a stimulating character, 
and has. disturbed, rather than helped, my mental 
processes, increasing nervous tension and not, to any 
great extent, increasing effectiveness of concentration. 
I have, in the last few years, practically given up the TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
59 
habit of smoking because of this rather undesirable 
effect upon me, both physically and mentally.” 
Author D: “I began to smoke when I was a 
junior in college, at the age of twenty, largely from 
imitation. The amount of tobacco consumed increased 
considerably during the next two or three years. When 
I was twenty-two, and a student at , circum- 
stances were such that smoking while at work in my 
office or study was permitted, and the result was con- 
siderably to increase the consumption of tobacco. Two 
or three years later I stopped smoking for a year to 
demonstrate to my mother that I could do it, and in- 
cidentally to win a bet of fifty dollars from her. 
Promptly at the expiration of the year I ‘lit up,’ and 
enjoyed smoking again immensely. 
“About three years ago I made a radical reduction in 
the consumption of tobacco, because of a local irrita- 
tion which appeared upon my tongue and which caused 
me some apprehension. Since that time I have prob- 
ably smoked about from one fourth to one tenth as 
much as I did during the twenty years of my life 
preceding. 
“Concerning the general effect of smoking on mental 
processes, whatever may be the effect at the outset, 
there is little doubt but that one who uses tobacco 
habitually receives a considerable mental stimulation 
from it. In my own case, I have a decided eagerness 
to smoke when I am engaged upon a task which re- 
quires the production of new material, when I want 60 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
to get ideas and to arrange them in good order and to 
do this at high speed. Of course, it is difficult to tell 
how much of this desire to smoke under those condi- 
tions is habit. The fact remains that I feel uneasy and 
less competent if I do not smoke. 
“On the occasions when I have ceased smoking, I 
have felt none of the tremendous cravings that some 
persons describe. The chief task in stopping smoking 
is to remove the visual stimulus. The moments when 
I have a decided desire to smoke are those when I catch 
sight of a cigar or even of an ash tray or a box of 
matches. When I stop smoking for a week or a month, 
as I do now and then, just to see that I can do it, my 
first step is to pack away out of sight everything that 
is associated with smoking. Under those conditions 
the most that I feel is the mild degree of annoyance and 
uneasiness when situations arise in which I ordinarily 
would be smoking.” 
Author E: “I am a very slight user of tobacco 
myself, sometimes going for a month or two without 
smoking at all, and when I do smoke it is only the 
mildest cigarettes. Occasionally, when I have a bit of 
hard mental labor I do find stimulus over a few hours 
from smoking a few cigarettes. I think it aids intel- 
lectual work to that extent. I should be inclined to 
believe, however, that I should deteriorate if I kept up 
smoking and attempted to rely on it for a stimulus. 
I smoked a few cigarettes as a boy and then I smoked 
a pipe for a few years between twenty-three and thirty TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
61 
years of age. I gave up smoking entirely for a good 
many years because I thought it did not fit in with my 
profession 
“I might make another point, namely, that I think 
that after a hearty meal, when one is rather tired at 
the end of a day’s work, a cigarette or two seems de- 
cidedly beneficial to digestion and one’s feeling of well- 
being, without being too stimulating. 
“I insist that a large share of the talk about smoking 
of cigarettes on the part of those who use very much 
stronger form of tobacco in the shape of cigars and 
pipes is simply absurd. To hear some fellow who 
smokes eight or ten strong cigars in a day talk about 
the effect of cigarettes, which of course contain so 
much less nicotine in proportion, is childish. But I 
grant the undesirability of cigarettes for boys to smoke 
—they ought not to smoke at all. For years now I have 
been unable to smoke a cigar or a pipe because they are 
so strong that they would make me ill, whereas a 
cigarette doesn’t have the slightest effect—there is so 
little of the drug absorption.” 
I 
Author F: “I beg to say that I have been a very 
moderate user of tobacco since the age of twenty-five, 
having averaged less than one cigar a day, and always 
using mild cigars. Smoking is a very definite stimulus 
to me, and smoking two cigars can be distinctly felt as 
what I should regard as excessive stimulation resulting 
in nervousness. Smoking is never a sedative to me. 
I smoke on three sorts of occasions—after an occa- 62 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
sional heavy dinner, for stimulation before important 
work, and sometimes for social purposes. Ordinarily 
I think the man who never uses tobacco is better off, 
but I should not hold moderate smoking against any 
one in my employ.” 
Author G: “(i) I am unable to say whether to- 
bacco has a beneficial, harmful, or neutral effect upon 
my mental processes when used in moderation. When 
used in excess, I am inclined to think it has a harmful 
effect. A pipe after breakfast, another after lunch, and 
three or four in the evening seem to keep me nervously 
satisfied without any harmful effect. 
“(2) Before the age of thirty-three I smoked only 
sporadically and then very little indeed. When I came 
to at the age of thirty-three I began to smoke 
more regularly and was soon confirmed in the habit. I 
have never wanted to quit, or tried to. 
“(3) I have engaged few men for service, but if I 
were doing so I should probably take no account what- 
ever of the use of tobacco in the case of full-grown 
men.” 
Author H: “I never smoked until I was thirty-four 
years of age, and then for a year or two I smoked a 
great deal. I enjoyed it and it seemed to be a slight 
stimulant to mental processes. In the last ten years I 
have smoked more or less, more when I was engaged in 
writing a book. Almost all my literary composition I 
have done while smoking. It seemed to help me to TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
63 
concentrate and to keep me going more steadily than 
I had been able to do before I began to smoke. How- 
ever, this may have been mere autosuggestion. I 
cannot be sure that I really did better with than with- 
out it. I am pretty sure of this, however, that I worked 
more steadily at my writing one day after another when 
I smoked than in the days before I began. Then I 
never knew when I sat down whether I would be able 
to do anything that day or not. But when I smoked I 
could depend on getting in a day’s work. 
“I have always enjoyed a pipe or a good cigar but 
notwithstanding this I have practically stopped. I 
have not smoked, except very occasionally, for a long 
time. There were various reasons for stopping. First, 
I became convinced that I felt better with the tobacco 
out of my system than when smoking. It was not easy 
to confine my smoking to stated times; I wanted to do 
it all the time, and the unrest when I could not smoke 
was a nuisance. 
“I am quite sure, as far as I am concerned, that the 
habit is somewhat harmful physiologically. I have 
decided that I can do my ordinary work as well, if not 
better, without tobacco. I should mention also that 
smoking irritates my throat and bronchial passages to 
some extent and as I have some trouble anyway with 
those regions I have felt that I was foolish to continue. 
Since stopping, my mind is clearer and I feel better 
every way. My only times of craving for tobacco are 
when I am mentally or physically quite tired, or when I 
am nervous or troubled over some matter. It is not 64 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
exactly a craving now, but rather an awareness that at 
such times a smoke would be a real solace.” 
Author I: “I really have never been able to come 
to any opinion about the use of tobacco. I smoke very 
rarely myself, about twenty cigars a year, at a maxi- 
mum, I should say, and find no marked after-effects 
either for good or bad. It should be said that I always 
smoke in the evening in society and never attempt to 
do any work afterward until next morning, so that 
offers no test. I began about twenty-two, or so, and 
have never developed a habit. I never take it into ac- 
count in selecting men and cannot say from observa- 
tion that there is any constant difference among men 
of my acquaintance between men who do and men who 
do not smoke.” 
Group IV 
Scientists—Physical and Biological 
Author A: “I began smoking fairly regularly when 
I was about twenty-five years old. Up to that time I 
had smoked only at very rare intervals. In the last 
twenty-five years I have been a regular but very mod- 
erate smoker, limiting myself to one or two cigars or 
pipes a day. I have never been able to see that smoking 
has had either a beneficial or a harmful effect upon my 
mental processes. If I should smoke two or three 
cigars in an evening I should probably have a more or 
less sleepless night. In engaging men for service of TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
65 
any sort, I have never taken into account their degree 
of indulgence in tobacco and I have never observed 
that those who do not use it are any more or less effi- 
cient than those who do.” 
Author B: “I have never used tobacco until very 
lately, and being now fifty-five years of age I may say 
that I have no liking for it, although no distinct aver- 
sion. There is certainly not the slightest risk of my 
developing a tobacco habit, for I only smoke a cigarette 
occasionally after a public dinner as an aid in conversa- 
tion or to avoid being considered ‘off’ or opposed to its 
use. I cannot say that I derive any particularly pleas- 
ant or unpleasant effects therefrom, or that I have ob- 
served any harmful results; but rather that I look upon 
it as a pure stimulant or a relief, although in a far from 
satisfying manner. I cannot say that the effect men- 
tally has been stimulating, although I had rather hoped 
it would have a soothing result, but I am hardly a good 
judge, since I seldom smoke more than two, or at most 
three, cigarettes, and those only half through, because, 
as I have said, there is nothing particularly attractive in 
the tobacco habit as far as my own experience goes. 
“I began to smoke when I was about sixteen or 
seventeen years of age and had the same experience at 
that time; in fact, a rather definite dislike, so that I 
had not touched a cigar or cigarette for more than 
thirty years, until, as said before, very lately. I believe 
that smoking is largely a matter of habit, because of its 
universality. Men like to have habits in common; and 66 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
in my own case I have for years felt the difficulty of a 
situation where every one was smoking but myself. It 
is one of the most useful means of forming acquaint- 
ances and promoting pleasant conversations, and, as far 
as I can judge, smoking has a soothing effect, though I 
would not go as far as to say, as Tolstoy does, that it 
has a stupefying effect. I have always thought that 
Tolstoy’s indictment of smoking and drinking was per- 
haps the strongest framed on general grounds. 
“We do not consider the question of smoking in en- 
gaging employees, certainly not in my own office; but I 
may say I have a strong aversion to young men who 
smoke excessively, as most of them will do when the 
habit has been formed very early. Such experience as 
I have had with young excessive smokers has certainly 
been such as to show that it is detrimental to their 
mental and moral well-being; and I am not so sure but 
that, all things considered, drinking habits, if formed 
early in life, are less pernicious than smoking habits, 
because in the former cause and effect are so much 
more closely related, while in the latter the evil conse- 
quences are frequently not apparent until many years 
alc', it at all. I would say, offhand and of course 
without any specific evidence to support such a state- 
ment, that it is my general impression that young men 
who smoke excessively, as most of them do, are less 
trustworthy, less efficient, and worst of all, fail in the 
invaluable trait of capacity for sustained attention. 
They are restless when deprived of their cigarettes and 
indifferent to the consequences of neglect of duty when TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
67 
they seek seclusion for a smoke, even though it is in 
office hours and they are in the midst of some strenu- 
ous effort which demands complete concentration of 
the mind.” 
Author C: “I use tobacco rather freely, mostly in 
the form of self-made cigarettes, using plug cut. I 
have used the same tobacco for about twenty years. I 
seldom smoke cigars or a pipe and seldom so-called 
Turkish cigarettes. I have a feeling that the use of a 
single brand of tobacco has its advantage. I scarcely 
smoked until I was thirty years of age. Since then, 
with periods of intermission of three to six months, I 
have used tobacco quite freely. Tobacco never made 
me ill even when it was first used and on the whole does 
not appear to have a deleterious effect. How much 
stimulation there is I am not quite prepared to state. 
It seems to me easier to do certain types of mental 
work, writing, composing, and reading while using to- 
bacco. I am uncertain whether this is a result of habit 
or rather due to stimulus. 
“I never consider the question of smoking or use of 
tobacco in any other form when engaging men for 
service in the department. We have, of course, certain 
rules concerning smoking in the laboratories. It is 
allowed only in the private rooms but this does not con- 
cern primarily the use of tobacco but regulates some- 
what the extent of its use. 
‘T am free to confess that I have not found that men 
who do not use it are capable of more or better work. 68 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
I am certain that in thinking of the associates in my 
department I would not class them as such who have 
smoked in comparing them with those who have not 
smoked. I find that I have had very efficient men in 
both classes and they do not differentiate on use or 
non-use of tobacco.” 
Author D: “So far as I, myself, am concerned, 
I was a persistent user of tobacco in all forms of smok- 
ing for more than forty years. In early life I had some 
prominence in athletics, and have been interested in out- 
of-door work since. I have not used tobacco in any 
form for more than two years, simply because the de- 
sire to do so disappeared. I have not noticed at any 
time any change or any influence.” 
Author E: “I have for twenty years or more been 
an occasional smoker, but I have never used tobacco 
in any large quantities because it very quickly affects 
the optical muscles in my case and to some extent tends 
to produce vasomotor disturbances of a mild kind. In 
other words, for my nervous temperament it quickly 
becomes toxic in its effects.” 
Author F: “I smoke cigars, but am unable to say 
that I believe them to have a beneficial or harmful effect 
upon my mental processes. I have several times 
stopped smoking, and later taken it up again. Dur- 
ing 1917 I stopped smoking for an entire year. I have 
been unable to note any difference of mental or physi- 
cal efficiency, although I have experimented with TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
69 
myself in the attempt to find them if they existed. In 
engaging men for service in our organization, I do not 
take into account whether or not they use tobacco, nor 
have I been able to convince myself that those who use 
it are more or less efficient than those who do not.” 
Author G: “I do not use it and never have. 
“I have watched its effect for years. While I have 
no collected data of experiments as to its deleterious 
effect upon the physical and mental abilities of men 
there is a decided assurance as to such effect. Young 
men—boys—from fourteen to twenty-five, who use 
cigarettes show lack of energy, hazy memory, general 
unreliability. More forceful, however, is the pernicious 
effect of tobacco in any form upon the aesthetic and 
moral nature. Many men, otherwise gentlemen, will 
lie like damned souls as to their smoking, will pledge 
themselves not to do so, and in ten minutes be found 
violating their pledge. And then, too, they show 
utterly callous indifference, almost without exception, 
to the rights of others, smoking in dining rooms, in 
one’s private house and resenting any interference or 
restraint. This is, to me, one of the really serious 
effects of tobacco, in that it demonstrates a lowering of 
the moral and social tone, callous indifference, and 
petulant disregard for the rights of others—a lessening 
of the moral tension, a lowering of the already too low 
standard of mutual consideration and courtesy. 
“In the carrying on of my own work I would never 
allow a smoker of any kind on my premises or in my 70 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
home—if I were free to dictate. The habit is a vile 
one, its influence bad in every way, and I have neither 
tolerance nor patience with those who force its noxious 
results upon me and those who feel as I do.” 
Author H: “I am a very moderate smoker, and I 
have not observed any effect, one way or the other. I 
have no knowledge of the specific effect of tobacco 
upon any of my colleagues, many of whom are at least 
moderate smokers.” 
Author I: “I have never used it in any form, and 
being of a highly sensitive, nervous temperament, have 
long ago decided that I should not have been here to 
report if I had used it in any form; but have, being a 
close observer, seen its effect on many thousands of 
people who have been in my employ or whom I have 
met socially and otherwise. There may be certain 
cases where the use of tobacco would be the least of 
two evils, like having a hand cut off to save the body 
or taking strychnine or other drugs to tide the whole 
human system over a crisis. I never remember observ- 
ing such a case, however. 
“In my own work during the past forty years I have 
employed eight hundred to a thousand different men, 
mostly Americans, but many of other nationalities. 
During part of the year I employ fifteen to eighteen 
men and the best of these I select to keep over the 
remainder of the year: some five to eight men. Years 
ago, before I had noticed the fact (as I had other 
things to think of) my foreman said to me, ‘Why is it, TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
71 
Mr. , that all the men you keep over winter do 
not use tobacco, while about every one you turn off 
uses it?’ After this I took special observation regard- 
ing this matter and found this fact very plainly promi- 
nent : taking the average workman (and much of my 
work requires a steady hand, eye, and nerves) those 
who use tobacco in any form have, without almost any 
exception, been found wanting. A tobacco user cannot 
usually attend to refined work, and to excuse himself, 
he almost always calls this kind of work ‘puttering.’ 
These men can work at shoveling and other work that 
requires little brain or nervous alertness and attention, 
but they cannot generally be trusted with refined work 
for any length of time, and I am certain that, taking 
the whole population, while many very intelligent men 
use tobacco, yet their fine nervous organization is more 
or less injured by its use. Tobacco and any other drug 
nerve stimulant has a tendency to destroy the finer 
nerve connections—those which evolution has produced 
last, the very flower and foliage of the evolutionary 
processes. While some may claim that stimulants keep 
them up to concert pitch, yet for the race this must 
necessarily be more or less destructive, even though 
thought necessary by the individual. I have not a 
shadow of a doubt that several of my young friends are 
now in their graves, mostly, if not wholly, through the 
use of cigarettes. To my mind, however, it is very 
difficult to draw the line between natural stimulation 
and overstimulation, for even overwork may have al- 
most as deleterious an effect as drug overstimulation 72 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
(in this I am giving my own self away), but one thing 
is certain: the use of alcoholic liquors, tobacco, and 
any other nerve stimulant should always be avoided by 
growing people if they expect to develop to the fullest 
extent which life affords.” 
Author J: “I have never used tobacco. In en- 
gaging men I take into account, slightly, the excessive 
indulgence in tobacco which I am inclined to think 
makes them dreamy and less capable of bringing things 
to a head.” 
Author K: “My experience does not by any means 
bear out the statement that the scientific men of 
or any other state are habitual smokers, still less 
‘furious’ smokers [reference is here made to the state- 
ment of Author E, Group II, p. 54. M. V. O’S.] and 
those of my acquaintance to whom the latter term ap- 
plies have not as a rule been very active in science. I 
may mention a few who do not smoke, and you may 
judge for yourself as regards this.” [A list of note- 
worthy scientists is here given.—M. V. O’S.] 
“Three of the most distinguished of my students are 
non-smokers. I don’t happen to know a single man 
distinguished in zoology who is a ‘furious smoker.’ 
It certainly is a drug not useful in distinguished work. 
“Except within the range of my personal experience 
I have not watched the habits of scientific men. As I 
remember, however, the two remarkably able men who 
were with me on my work for the fur seal were neither 
of them smokers. CHAPTER IV 
TESTIMONIES OF MEN AND WOMEN OF DISTINCTION 
(Concluded) 
Group V 
Literary Men, Artists, Musicians 
Author A: “I use tobacco: I began its use about 
twelve years ago when I was just past thirty years of 
age. I smoke cigars and a pipe. I do not chew tobacco 
or smoke cigarettes. I smoke on an average of six or 
eight cigars a day. I don’t think the use of tobacco 
hurts me; on the other hand, I’m sure it doesn’t do me 
any good.” 
Author B: “I have used tobacco ever since I was 
twenty years old, and I am now thirty-two. If my col- 
legiate standing suffered by reason of this use, or if 
my present production is lessened by it, or if the quality 
of work is lower than it might be, then I am indeed 
misguided. 
“It so happens that I am not personally acquainted 
with any writer who does not smoke. I can conceive 
that a man might smoke without writing, but I am en- 
tirely unable to conceive how a man could write with- 
out smoking. My hours of smoking are limited solely 
73 74 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
by my hours of sleep, and I still accomplish more actual 
work in a given period than any other writer I Know. 
“I am firmly convinced that it is a poison, but I am 
equally convinced that it is the pleasantest poison there 
is, and since I have never felt the slightest evil effect 
from it, I am going ahead until something or somebody 
compels me to stop. 
“During my career as a publisher and an employer 
of labor, it was immaterial to me whether employees 
smoked or not.” 
Author C: “I am six feet. Weight one hundred 
and eighty. 
“I have smoked since I was fourteen. I am now 
thirty-eight. My smoking has been of cigarettes, pipes, 
cigars. Most of the time I have smoked ‘to excess/ 
i.e., ten or fifteen times a day. Recent examinations 
show heart, lungs, and other organs in excellent con- 
dition. The effect upon me and others as I have ob- 
served it is dependent upon individual susceptibility and 
temporary condition of the body. Abstinence is there- 
fore a matter for individual regulation, not only upon 
moral and personal liberty considerations, but upon 
those of expediency in physical regimen. It is useless 
to deny that tobacco is a devitalizer, but it does not 
compare with overeating.” 
Author D: “I began to smoke at the age of nine 
but found its pursuit very difficult; but at sixteen I 
became addicted to the habit, and have since rarely been 
without a cigarette in my waking hours. The time I TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
75 
miss it most is in classrooms and church. The only 
effect smoking has upon me is to make me very cross 
when I can’t. So far as I can tell, smoking has had no 
effect one way or the other upon the efficiency of men 
I have known.” 
Author E: “I began smoking ‘in earnest’ when I 
was eighteen. I smoked a pipe occasionally, but pre- 
ferred cigarettes. I have been a constant smoker ever 
since. I never go to work until my pipes and cigarettes 
are laid on my desk. Tobacco, I should say, has aided 
me considerably in my work, as the mild narcotic helps 
me to concentrate and stimulates inventiveness. 
“As to the effect of tobacco on my general health, I 
cannot say—I should say the effect has been insignifi- 
cant. Had I gone in for athletics instead of mental 
effort, I suppose I should have had to cut down on my 
allowance of tobacco, but in my experience brain 
workers are seldom perfect physical specimens. I sel- 
dom employ men, but if I were an employer I should 
certainly not refuse work to tobacco-users. In fact the 
most efficient and practical men I know are constant 
cigarette smokers; most of them are remarkably 
‘young’ for their age, energetic, quick, and wiry. In 
my experience tobacco, when used by adults, is less in- 
jurious than tea or coffee. No one can deny the ill 
effects of nicotine on young boys, but I take the priv- 
ilege of doubting if cigarettes have killed or stunted any 
more children than have died or become permanent 
dyspeptics from the eating of uncooked fruit.” 76 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
Author F: “I began at fifteen to smoke cigarettes, 
and have not discontinued. The number smoked per 
diem was gradually increased, until circa my twentieth 
year I was smoking twenty cigarettes each day, and 
this has since remained my steady average. At forty 
I am aware of no ill effects from the habit. It has been 
my experience that those who use tobacco are brighter 
mentally than those who eschew it, though whether the 
practice makes for cleverness, or obtuseness for self- 
denial, I cannot say.” 
Author G: “I began to smoke when I was about 
twenty-eight and have been a mild smoker of cigars 
and cigarettes for about twenty-four years. A little of 
it, especially cigarettes, because they are milder—I do 
not inhale—seems to have a good effect on my nerves. 
More than a little makes me nervous. 
“In engaging people to work for me I have never 
cared whether or not they smoked, unless it was ex- 
cessive and therefore part of a general tendency to 
nervous extremes. I have known some of the most 
efficient men who did not smoke at all, but in my ex- 
perience this rule has been the other way.” 
Author H: “I have been an inveterate smoker of 
cigars and pipe all my life and as far as I know they 
have never done me any harm, physically, and I believe 
have had a beneficial effect on my mental processes. 
In engaging men for service I never take into account 
whether or not they indulge in tobacco and I have never TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
77 
found those that do not use it any more efficient than 
those that do. In any case, I am strong for tobacco!” 
Author I (a woman): “For myself, I do not 
smoke, do not feel the slightest need of this or any 
other stimulant, even tea or coffee, which I never take 
at all. And I have a theory that anything which stim- 
ulates the nerve centers is directly in the way, is no less 
than a hindrance to creative work. This is because I 
do not believe that the best creative work is dependent 
on the physical or even on the mental alone, but that 
for it another faculty, rather an extension of faculty 
about which we know little, is operative. 
“But that is only my own idea. Almost every woman 
doing creative work whom I know does smoke. I be- 
long to a club of sixty women in New York, all doing 
creative work, and at their luncheons which I have 
been attending this winter the air has always been blue. 
They smoke right through the luncheons, and the chair- 
man usually conducts the meetings afterward, smok- 
ing. But about their dependence on this for stimulation 
while they are working, I do not know. 
“I think that I would say that in literary or other 
work which is not creative but mental—as journalism, 
or working with facts, or outlining a plot, or gathering 
material—all of which tires one as creative work does 
not do, then tobacco or any other stimulant might help.” 
Author J (a woman) : “I would not go so far as 
to say there was inspiration in smoking. But it cer- 78 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
tainly does increase blood pressure, a desirable condi- 
tion after the torpidity of the night, if one has the 
habit of morning work. 
“On the other hand, if I happen not to have been 
smoking for quite a while before beginning a book, I 
find that a cup of tea is all I need—smoking does not 
occur to me. It is nothing but a habit. Frequently 
after finishing a book I cut off short, and in a little 
while do not notice it. It does not affect my nerves one 
way or the other. If, however, I follow one piece of 
work with another, and am smoking, I keep on, as I 
have no time to break myself of the habit of dependence 
—while the brain has the habit of being stimulated you 
must keep on until the work is finished, no doubt of 
that. But I have written a good many of my books, 
including my last, without the aid of tobacco. As I 
had just come out of the hospital when I began it—or 
rather, got finally down to steady work, I was not 
smoking and felt no impulse to. 
“I do not recall any woman writer of my acquaint- 
ance who does not smoke. told me that she 
smokes continuously while writing—as she uses long 
hand she can write with one hand and smoke with the 
other. This, of course, is impossible with the type- 
writer. I do now recall one woman writer, at present 
in this hotel, who does not smoke, Elinor Glyn! 
“Personally, I think it wholly unnecessary, and only 
really enjoy a cigarette when in congenial company. It 
is not even then necessary, but certainly promotes 
camaraderie. I have often gone two years without TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
79 
smoking, and only took it up when, my work over, I 
went out among people, and formed the habit again, 
particularly in the country houses. 
“This incident—I had forgotten it—may interest 
you. While writing , in Helena, Montana, I 
caught a frightful cold which I could not get rid of. 
My head felt packed with lead, and to write was impos- 
sible. I went to the doctor and he told me that I had 
one of the colds peculiar to high altitudes and that he 
could not cure me if I continued to inflame the mucous 
membrane with smoke. I demurred at giving it up, as I 
had accustomed myself to it, but he said he could give 
me a tonic that would tide me over. I gave it up, took 
the tonic for a week, and never missed it. I shouldn’t 
wonder if self-hypnotism had something to do with it. 
For all I know the tonic may have been plain water. 
“I think there is no doubt that cigarette smoking (I 
know nothing of any other sort) lowers vitality. I am 
one of the strongest and most vital of women and rarely 
feel tired when I am not smoking, but I always feel 
more or less tired when I am, and do not take half as 
much exercise. My mental vitality is unimpaired but 
I feel little energy otherwise. I fancy that if I had 
kept a diary I should find that, as a general rule, I do 
not write as much a day when smoking as when I am 
not. 
“However, there is an exception. Last summer with 
the thermometer between 85 and 90 I wrote a book of 
fifty-five thousand words in three weeks, and smoked a 
good deal. The circumstances were peculiar, and I was 80 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
not only uncommonly interested but in a great hurry. 
However, I fancy that if I had not been smoking when 
I suddenly and quite unexpectedly began to write this 
story, I should have done as well. It is one of the best 
I ever did. 
“The reason men cannot stand smoking is because 
they inhale. I never have inhaled and that is probably 
the reason not only why it does me no harm but I can 
break off short and feel no result but a let down of 
nervous and mental energy for a week or so, which 
gives me a rest. 
“I am convinced, however, that the necessity for to- 
bacco, except where inhalers are saturated with it, is 
all imagination. We all like secretly to spoil ourselves 
one way or another. It is a way of getting even with 
life, which is not at all inclined to spoil us.” 
Author K (a woman) : “Broadly generalizing, I 
would say that women writers are divided about as 
are men in the use of tobacco. Some of them use it 
and some do not. When they do I think they are less 
inveterate smokers than men, less dependent upon to- 
bacco. The question is, of course, not one that involves 
writers any more than any other professional class. 
“American women use tobacco now much more mod- 
erately than do their European and English sisters. I 
have never heard one of them admit that tobacco 
harmed her or that she used it to excess. But of course 
this may be a matter of self-deception. 
“In Mrs. Asquith’s reference to the smoking of her TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
81 
women friends she did not limit herself to the literary 
crowd but to all of smart social England, which has 
always smoked. 
“There is nothing particularly significant in the re- 
vival of tobacco. Three or four generations ago the 
pipe was in quite common use among women and the 
use of snuff for the rubbing stick in the south still 
survives. 
“Personally, I believe the smoking of cigarettes is not 
so much a drug habit as a nervous habit. It classes 
itself with other nervous habits, the twirling of buttons, 
the playing with table silver, the rapping of teeth with a 
lead pencil, and a hundred others.” 
Author L (a woman) : “It seems to me the easiest 
answer to your inquiry is that no women smoked until 
very lately, so that Charlotte Bronte, Jane Austen, 
George Eliot, Mrs. Browning, and all that great list 
were able to compose without the aid of drugs. 
“So to the man who did not see how any one could 
do ‘imaginative work’ without tobacco,—were there no 
poets and dramatists, pray, before the sixteenth cen- 
tury?” [Here follows a list of seventeen women 
writers, acquaintances of Author L, who were asked 
about their experiences with tobacco. Twelve of them 
said they did not use it, while five of them did, three 
of them prodigiously.—M. V. O’S.] 
Author M (a woman) : “I have never found smok- 
ing hurt me. In six years I was ill and never touched 82 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
a cigarette, but when I was well I returned to them. 
Both great and small men have smoked and no one 
can lay down a law about it.” 
Group VI 
Presidents, Congressmen, Cabinet Officers, and 
Diplomats 
Author A: “I have to say that I have been a con- 
stant if not an excessive smoker of tobacco since I was 
eighteen and am, therefore, not competent from my 
own personal experience to determine whether smok- 
ing affects beneficially or injuriously the intellectual 
processes. I do know that the use of tobacco is sooth- 
ing to the mind and is conducive to meditation and I 
have found that men who smoke are less prone to emo- 
tional judgments, less liable to act without deliberation, 
less susceptible to fads and fantastical ideas. 
“As to the accuracy and activity of mental processes, 
I see no difference in the smoker and the non-smoker 
among the men with whom I am associated. I never 
have taken into account in employing men the fact as 
to whether or not they use tobacco. I have never 
thought and do not think now that tobacco-smoking has 
the least effect on the mental faculties, provided a man 
has attained physical maturity.” 
Author B: “I am a user of tobacco—sometimes 
with commendable moderation and other times more 
excessively than is becoming. I am perfectly confident TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
83 
that it has an injurious effect on me. It is often a very 
soothing thing in moments of mental and nervous 
strain, but I have an abiding conviction of its injurious 
effect on both the nervous and circulatory system. I 
have given it up at times, because I have felt the injury 
very directly, but I confess it affords me a great deal of 
comfort at times, and I yield to the use of it in spite of 
my better convictions in the matter.” 
Author C: “I used tobacco prior to 1912 for some 
years. I quit it absolutely then and have never touched 
it since. I regard it as harmful to me and would not 
for any cause resume the habit.” 
Author D: “I do not use tobacco in any form and 
never have used it—not because I have any scruples 
against its use, but because, having failed to form the 
habit in my youth, I have no taste for it. . . . 
“I have never considered that a temperate use of 
tobacco affects the efficiency of the user either ad- 
versely or favorably. I assume that intemperate use 
would impair efficiency, if the extent were sufficient to 
injure heart, lungs, digestive apparatus, or other vital 
parts—just as efficiency would be impaired by an in- 
temperate indulgence in food, or by any other intemper- 
ance.” 
Author E: “I regret to say that I am a user of 
tobacco, and have been for forty years, more or less, 
smoking cigars; I smoke about half a dozen a day. If 
they have any bad effect on me I do not know it. Some- 84 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
times I think I will quit smoking, but just why I don’t 
know, because I am not aware of any deleterious in- 
fluences on my intellectual processes or efficiency. 
However, when I was younger I only smoked a few 
cigars, probably three a day. I can’t say it has a bad 
effect on me in any way, but for fear it might have I 
am thinking of discontinuing it. It would probably be 
better for me if I did. I cannot say that those who do 
not use tobacco in any form are more efficient than 
those who do use it.” 
Author F: “I did not begin to smoke tobacco until 
my thirtieth year. Since then I have used as much of 
it as I needed, and have not found it in any way det- 
rimental to my health. This judgment my physicians 
have confirmed. 
“Its effects are sedative, when it is used in modera- 
tion. Thus it becomes helpful to work by acting as an 
antidote to nervousness and bad temper. What moder- 
ation means must be determined by its effect in each 
individual case, just as in the use of tea, coffee, pie, and 
chewing gum. The man who inveighs against the use 
of any of these things as in itself sinful is, in my opin- 
ion, a fanatical ass. The man who abuses any of these 
things is evidently a self-indulgent sinner. No doubt 
there are some people who cannot use tobacco at all 
without injury, just as there are some who cannot eat 
strawberries without being poisoned.” TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
85 
Group VII 
Judges and Lawyers 
Author A: “There is no question as to the im- 
portance of the subject you have under investigation, 
for the (to me) obvious reason that the qualities of 
tobacco are such that their bad effect upon a user must 
be conclusively presumed. Nevertheless, I feel disin- 
clined to give you a statement for public use, because 
you or anybody else reading it would immediately be 
curious as to why on earth ‘the fellow doesn't stop.’ 
As to this, be charitable in your judgment, as you 
would of the man who persists in drinking coffee or 
tea, both of which are, to me, powerful stimulants. 
“The most vicious ill effect of the use of tobacco is 
on the growing boy. If we could only beat it into his 
head to leave it alone until he is full grown, the bad 
results would be substantially lessened. 
“I would feel like a hypocrite publicly to denounce 
old King Nicotine after having worked and played with 
him through all these years.” 
Author B: “I have never used tobacco in any form. 
This statement might be modified by saying that upon 
four or five occasions in my life I have tried to smoke 
a cigarette after dinner to observe its effects. It has 
always produced a sort of nausea. This was so pro- 
nounced when as a boy I attempted to imitate the others 
in this regard that I never passed the ‘stomach-ache 86 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
period’ and no doubt this is responsible for the fact that 
I do not smoke. 
“Here in the Juvenile Court I do not think any of 
our officers use tobacco, but I cannot say that I em- 
ployed them with the idea in mind as to whether they 
did or did not. 
“While I have always talked to boys against the evils 
of cigarette smoking, I am inclined to think the evil is 
very much exaggerated, notwithstanding it is no doubt 
one of the contributing causes of physical and mental 
weakness among children. There are strange excep- 
tions. 
“The finest-looking boy of fifteen I ever saw, who 
was a champion rifle shot because of his steady hand 
and steady nerve, had been a chronic cigarette smoker 
since he was seven years of age. I doubt if I should 
want to use this in a public statement since it seems to 
me so exceptional that it might lead to misunderstand- 
ing, yet such was the fact, for the case interested me so 
much that I thoroughly investigated it. The boy, 
though only fifteen, would have passed for eighteen or 
twenty. He was ruddy-cheeked and bright-eyed. 
“I have also noticed that some of the strongest boys 
physically have smoked cigarettes, but I still contend 
that in the majority of cases it has a bad effect upon the 
nerves of the mental and physical system. 
“I think it was Dr. who once visited us in 
the Juvenile Court here and, if I recall correctly, ridi- 
culed the idea of the cigarette being as dangerous as it 
is claimed. On this theory he spoke with great firm- TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
87 
ness and gave many reasons for his conclusions that the 
whole thing was terribly exaggerated. I cannot say 
that I entirely share his views except to the point of 
admitting exaggeration, which is true of most all bad 
things and a common human failing with zealous peo- 
ple who fight these evils.” 
Author C: “I began using tobacco when I was 
fourteen or fifteen years old, and smoked, with little 
interruption, steadily until I was twenty-seven. I am 
very fond of the effect of tobacco. Its relation to my 
mental processes is best described possibly as follows: 
“When I have worked upon any question, such for 
instance as a legal question, and have arranged the 
various cases and ‘roughed out’ my position, as it were, 
having assembled all the material on my desk, I can 
smoke a good cigar half through, then lay it aside and 
organize this material into the final form desired more 
effectively, it has always seemed to me, by the use of 
tobacco than without it. 
“I gave up the use of tobacco in Alaska because of 
the failure of the supply and the very bad effect that 
followed from smoking tea leaves. I have not smoked 
in later years, largely because I am so much indoors 
that I feared the effect of tobacco without vigorous 
outdoor work, which always accompanied my use of it 
in early years. 
“I do not regard the use of tobacco by mature per- 
sons as harmful to either their mental or physical 
strength. Excessive smoking of cigarettes during the 88 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
building years I regard as quite definitely harmful and 
as resulting in physical, mental, and moral deteriora- 
tion.” 
Author D: “I smoke moderately, that is three or 
four cigars a day. I think it has a beneficial effect 
upon my mental processes. I never smoked until after 
I was forty-five years old. I do not take into account 
the use of tobacco in engaging a man for service. I 
do not find non-smokers more efficient than those who 
smoke in moderation. I think excess in any form, 
whether it be in the use of tobacco, food, or sleep, does 
affect efficiency. I do not think any general conclusions 
on this subject applicable to all persons. I think the use 
or non-use of tobacco must be determined according to 
its effect on the individual constitution.” 
Group VIII 
School Superintendents 
Author A: “I use tobacco, but only in a very ir- 
regular manner. At times I will smoke a cigar every 
day for a week, then I may go weeks without smoking 
one. In other words, I have not the smoking habit to 
the extent that I feel that I must smoke a cigar at cer- 
tain stated intervals. Smoking as little as I do, 
perhaps, makes it all the more possible to analyze the 
effects of a cigar upon myself. 
“A great deal depends upon the character of the 
cigar. I cannot smoke a strong cigar. A mild cigar, 89 
TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
commonly called a Claro, is one which I enjoy most 
and which produces the most pleasant sensations. A 
cigar of this type causes a feeling of nervous exalta- 
tion. It seems to have the same effect on me that wine 
or any form of liquor has upon other people. It has 
plenty of kick and conversation in it. President 
says he believes he would have been a more agreeable 
man in his family had he smoked cigars. That states 
considerable of the truth about the matter, so far as I 
am concerned. 
“A cigar stimulates the action of the brain in some 
way or other. I think more rapidly and quickly and 
am predisposed more to conversation. As principal of 
a school, I was averse to employing any man teacher 
who used tobacco because of the bad example. . . . 
“Some men find a cigar or a pipe very helpful to them 
while they are doing a hard piece of work. I have 
never smoked a pipe, and I cannot handle a cigar and 
a piece of work at the same time, so I cannot give much 
help along that line. I do know, however, that it stim- 
ulates my imagination and my general power to think 
along new lines. If there are any ill consequences 
which follow, I am unable to detect them.” 
Author B: “I have thought many times that the 
man addicted to tobacco was not as mentally alert as 
one who did not use it. The men with whom I come 
in contact in my work nearly all use the weed occa- 
sionally. They are bright men and are doing most 
excellent work. I don’t see that the smoking is hurting 90 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
them in the least. In dealing with adolescent boys 
some time ago as a teacher, I could see a decided falling 
off of interest the minute a boy began to use tobacco in 
any form. This would lead me to believe that the to- 
bacco habit has a very serious effect on the adolescent 
youth of our land. With older people, it certainly does 
not seem to give the same reaction.” 
Author C: “I have never used tobacco in any form. 
I prefer men in my employ who do not use tobacco. 
I find them less efficient when addicted to its use.” 
Author D: “I do not indulge in the use of tobacco. 
In my cabinet, however, I have several men who do and 
others who do not. I am unable to observe any differ- 
ence between these two classes of men. 
“In my present personal staff, all of whom were se- 
lected by me, there are four men who use tobacco and 
one who does not. The four men who use tobacco are 
up to, or well past, the fifty-year mark, and I judge 
them to be equal in efficiency to those who do not.” 
Group IX 
Financiers and “Captains of Industry’* 
Author A: “I, personally, have been rather a con- 
stant user of tobacco for nearly twenty-five years and 
have never, at any stage, abandoned it. It is my ex- 
perience that it has a slightly harmful physical effect, 
especially on youths. As to its effect on mental proc- TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
91 
esses, I doubt if it has any great beneficial effect, and in 
my own experience I cannot say that it has any harmful 
effect. On the whole, perhaps, it has a slowing-down 
effect which, in cases of men under constant strain, is 
really beneficial. Smoking becomes a nervous habit 
which is, on the whole, a pleasant one, and I do not feel 
that the effects are harmful in any degree commen- 
surate with the pleasure. Of all bad habits, this is one 
which I would least deprecate, and in our business we 
do not allow this to prejudice our view of men whom 
we are engaging for service. 
“In this regard I think I might say that of leaders 
in banking and finance whom I am privileged to know 
in this country, I would estimate that at least ninety- 
five per cent use tobacco constantly.” 
Author B: “I commenced smoking tobacco when 
I was about eighteen years old, i.e., pipe and cigars, but 
I never chewed tobacco or smoked a cigarette. At the 
age of thirty-five I discontinued smoking. I am now 
past seventy-six and have had excellent health prac- 
tically all my life, before I smoked, while I was using 
tobacco, and after I discontinued using it, and it is my 
opinion that tobacco did me no good whatever and 
possibly some harm. 
“I am an employer of a large number of men. In 
hiring them I do not inquire whether they use tobacco 
or not, but many of them do, some do not. 
“Tobacco is said to have a soothing effect on many 
people but my experience while using it was that it was 92 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
more to be sociable, i.e., using tobacco because other 
men that I was associated with were using it; so my 
experience in the use of tobacco and my judgment of 
the effect it has on other men that I have been associated 
with is that they could all get along just as well without 
it, and in all probability better than they could by using 
it in any form whatever.” 
Author C: “I have smoked cigars and cigarettes 
ever since the early twenties, but never before that. My 
personal experience is that every one can judge as to 
whether it has a good or bad effect. To some people 
it is harmful, and to some people it is beneficial and 
seems to have a steadying effect upon their nerves and 
enables them to concentrate. I have always felt that it 
was a mistake for young men to smoke before they 
were in the twenties. I stop smoking on occasions just 
for the discipline. Never do I ask a man whether he 
smokes or not. 
“I think my first statement will cover your last ques- 
tion. Every one can judge for himself whether to- 
bacco harms him or not. Some people can eat one kind 
of food that is a poison to others. Experience will 
teach each one what is good for him.” 
Author D: “My own observations have covered 
about a hundred men. We have a force here of forty- 
five persons and our requirements are perhaps not 
average or typical, because we require a much higher 
standard of mentality than the average business. This TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
93 
is because our work is constantly new; we are always 
requiring persons to learn new things, and we must 
have keen thinkers. We especially value originality 
and resourcefulness in developing new ideas. 
“Until a few years ago we did not look carefully into 
the habits of the men whom we employed in the Copy 
Department, but, after a few experiments with men 
who were addicted to the cigarette habit, we came to 
the conclusion that it was not profitable for us to con- 
tinue to employ such men in the Copy Department. As 
a matter of fact, we also discriminate against them in 
other departments except under unusual circumstances, 
as we realize that there are exceptions to almost all 
rules. 
“We find that copy men who are addicted to this 
practice are unreliable, unimaginative, and lazy. The 
copy produced by them is not original, but usually runs 
along stereotyped and commonplace lines, and usually 
shows evidence of incorporating thoughts appropriated 
from other sources. 
“These men are mentally indolent, as they do not 
seem to have the energy or the incentive to think for 
themselves along original and imaginative lines. In 
other words, as was proved by a test reported by the 
Life Extension Institute, these persons are ‘deficient 
in the field of mental imagery.’ Also, their output is 
lower. They are lazy and they spend so much time in 
irrelevant distractions that they seem unable to get their 
minds on the work before them. They cannot concen- 
trate. If they tell you that a thing will be done by a 94 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
certain time, you can make up your mind that it will 
not be done unless you go in and follow them up con- 
stantly. I do not know whether these deficiencies are 
the result of the habit or the habit is a collateral of the 
deficiencies. 
“We have found by taking on men of careful per- 
sonal habits that we can secure a much greater output 
and, above all, a much higher quality than by employ- 
ing men indiscriminately. The brightest man we have 
in our organization, the one who is depended upon to 
originate the ideas for the most important campaigns, 
is one who does not use tobacco in any form. This is 
also true of our Copy Director, who is in charge of all 
the copy produced, and it is true also of our best-paid 
workers practically throughout the organization. It 
seems to make a difference in the pay envelope. We 
believe we have proven this beyond a doubt.” 
Group X 
Military and Naval Officers and Engineers 
Author A: “I entered the Naval Academy in 1871. 
In 1873 the Naval Academy regulations allowed cadet 
midshipmen, as we were then called, to smoke in a room 
set apart for that purpose. Many of my classmates 
had smoked, either secretly on the grounds, or prior to 
their entry. At any rate, I looked forward with some 
apprehension to the day when it would be up to me to 
show that I was a big enough man to smoke with the 
others. TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
95 
“The usual plan was carried out: The previous 
smokers preceded by a few minutes those who had 
never tried it; the windows were closed tight; after we 
entered, the door was locked, and we all lighted our 
pipes, cigars, or cigarettes, as the case might be. Why 
did we ever attempt it? Because it was the custom, I 
think long since abolished. Great goodness! How 
actively ill I was! The coming supper meant nothing 
in my life—if it was to be spared. However, I kept 
up smoking to a mild degree while at the Academy— 
could smoke any old pipe or cigar with the same non- 
chalance as an immoderate smoker. 
“From my graduation to the present—forty-five 
years—may be divided into three periods: 
“Moderation: 1875-1900. During this period, 
since promotion was very slow, held all junior positions 
up to lieutenant commander (same rank as major in 
army). Watches on board ship were four hours night 
and day. While the captain of the ship was always 
available, it was not considered good form to have the 
orderly call him, if an emergency was likely to eventu- 
ate during your watch. I found during this period that 
a good cigar before going on watch would keep the 
mental faculties on the alert and am sure that this 
character of smoking did no harm. 
“Immoderate: 1900-1916. Here is where I slipped 
a cog. Why? No reason except habit, no greater in- 
centive than during the previous twenty years. More 
opportunity existed, as my duties were such that I had 
no night work. It was simply a natural growth from 96 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
moderation. During that period I was becoming more 
and more my own boss, from a government standpoint, 
and more a slave to the habit. 
“Excessive: 1916-1920. I might much better have 
gone back to ‘moderation.’ Retired all of the period. 
Not enough for the idle hand to do. So easy to smoke, 
and carry the wherewithal with you. It was so usual 
to see the lighted end of a cigar or cigarette wherever 
you went, and so weak, but equally usual to light up 
again. There was no excuse. I had stopped saying, 
‘I ought not to, but will join you in one of your new 
brand,’ etc. I fell just the same and moderation was 
forgotten. Moderate is almost out of my mind, and 
away I go slipping, with but little thought of ‘excess,’ 
which, all told, is the pitfall with the smoker, the 
drinker, and the dope fiend. 
“Let us imagine the writer as he now is—not as you 
might probably imagine, an old sailor with deeply fur- 
rowed cheeks, a gruff voice, etc.—but from outward 
appearances, a rather nice-looking creature. He reads 
understandingly, but in a brief period after reading a 
most interesting article by, say, Mr. Hoover, he is 
likely, in telling others about it, to omit some salient 
point. He will not live as long as he would have done, 
in all probability, without tobacco, and he cannot make 
himself as agreeable and entertaining. Is not suffi- 
ciently given to recall the names of people lately met. 
Memory is surely affected. 
“Could I have a second life to live, tobacco would 
form no part of it. Moral: Unless one is positive, at TESTIMONIES OF DISTINGUISHED PERSONS 
97 
the age when he first seriously thinks of smoking, that 
he can always keep to moderate—do not start. 
“My reply, briefly, to your second paragraph is— 
generally harmful. 
“We do not take into account the question of use of 
tobacco when enlisting men (unless the Regulations 
have very lately changed). Men do not smoke except 
during meal hour—therefore no necessity to curb them. 
“Comparative efficiency of officers who do or do not 
smoke: For their first, say, ten to twenty years think 
the moderate smoker wins out. After that, as a rule, 
the non-smoker.” 
Author B: “I have used tobacco since I was a 
youth in my teens, although necessarily its use was 
somewhat moderate during the time I was at the United 
States Naval Academy, i.e., between the ages of fifteen 
and seventeen, because during most of that time the use 
of tobacco was prohibited. However, since graduating 
I have used tobacco constantly, smoking only. I have 
always thought that the use of tobacco has been bene- 
ficial in its effect upon mental processes. I have never 
had any inclination to give it up, and still find great 
solace and comfort in its use.” 
Author C: “I have been a smoker since I was 
thirty years old, but a moderate smoker for many years, 
though latterly, I am ashamed to have to confess, I 
have smoked a great deal more than I believe to be good 
for me. Much smoking that I do is from habit, and I 98 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
doubt if I get as much real pleasure from smoking as 
would a moderate smoker. I am sure that at times it 
causes insomnia. 
“On the whole, however, I have found a great deal 
of consolation in smoking. Many a time in former 
years when making rough trips away from civilization, 
a good cigar has helped to compensate for a poor meal. 
This from a mental and not physiological point of view. 
I have not observed any impairment of the mental 
processes in my case or that of men associated with me. 
Indeed I believe that the congenial atmosphere devel- 
oped in a company of smokers often contributes to 
successful business negotiations. 
“Confidentially, I may tell you that I would much 
prefer to carry on business negotiations with a man 
who smokes than one who does not. This must not 
imply that I thereby hope to secure an advantage of 
him through the lessening of his faculties. 
“One of my sons is a heavy smoker. He is about 
thirty-eight years old, but agrees with me that he would 
be better off if he did not smoke very much, and oc- 
casionally we both cut it out for a while, just to satisfy 
ourselves that we are not hopeless victims of the habit. 
This son is a very successful young business man and 
has an unusually clear vision in business matters. A 
second son, a few years younger, on the other hand 
does not touch tobacco. He has achieved great distinc- 
tion in his particular line of work.” CHAPTER V 
THE VERDICT OF OBSERVATION, INTROSPECTION, 
AND BIOGRAPHY 
After a study of the foregoing testimonies of men 
and women of distinction, the writer sought interviews 
with a number of his colleagues in the University of 
Wisconsin who use tobacco. The aim in the interviews 
was to determine to what extent men quite above the 
average in intellectual acumen and scientific training 
can deal analytically and impersonally with a situation 
in which they are personally involved. One of the 
writer’s assistants also interviewed a considerable num- 
ber of university instructors. These interviews con- 
firmed the impression made by the reading of the 
testimonies—to the effect that even men accustomed to 
severely critical analysis of matters in their respective 
fields find it very difficult to analyze the more subtle 
effects of an agent like tobacco upon their mental proc- 
esses. In many of the interviews the men who gave 
testimony were unable to answer definitely or satisfac- 
torily most of the questions put to them, except those 
relating to the pleasurable or disagreeable sensations 
derived from the use of tobacco. The men were always 
able to make general statements in response to the first 
question, “Do you think you are helped or hindered in 
99 100 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
your intellectual work by the use of tobacco ?” but when 
this was followed with detailed questions pertaining to 
the effects of tobacco on mental efficiency they would, as 
a rule, have to acknowledge that they had little accurate 
data upon which to base an opinion. 
The testimonies of the distinguished men presented 
in foregoing chapters are quite different in one respect 
from testimonies secured by Professor Fink in his 
study of the views of men in the S. A. T. C. at Miami 
University regarding the effects of tobacco upon effi- 
ciency. Forty-five men answered a questionnaire for 
him, thirty-one of the number being tobacco users and 
fourteen being abstainers. Thirty of the thirty-one 
addicts confessed to Professor Fink that they believed 
they were injured in body or in mind, or in both, by 
tobacco. One addict said that he could not tell whether 
he was injured or not. In a study made upon the men 
in the S. A. T. C. at Syracuse University, out of two 
hundred and fifty-five smokers, one hundred and fifty- 
nine said tobacco was harmful, and all but twenty- 
seven of two hundred and fifty-two non-smokers said 
it was harmful. 
Why should most of the men at Miami and Syracuse 
universities say that their efficiency was lowered by 
smoking, while as high as ninety-five per cent of the 
men of distinction who gave testimony in this investi- 
gation say that they have been unable to detect any 
mental or physical injury from the use of tobacco? 
There are several possible explanations of the wide dis- THE VERDICT OF OBSERVATION 
101 
parity between the testimonies of these different groups 
of men. It may be that men of distinction, being quite 
mature (otherwise they would not be distinguished) 
have for a considerable period been in a state of equilib- 
rium, physically and mentally, so that they are not 
aware of any fluctuation in their intellectual processes 
due to indulgence in or abstinence from tobacco. It 
is conceivable (but not probable, as suggested below) 
that their efficiency may have been lowered by tobacco 
during the early period of its use, but having reached 
a level where the fundamental and more stable intel- 
lectual functions are principally utilized, they are able 
to resist any disturbance from tobacco. The finer and 
more subtle intellectual processes may have been per- 
manently dulled by tobacco, and the addict would not 
now be aware of the fact that he had suffered any loss 
in intellectual acumen. Since he has receded to the 
level of stable intellectual function, he can run on with- 
out detecting any benumbing effects from tobacco. 
Such an explanation as given above does not seem 
probable, considering that the men who have given 
testimony have attained, and are now maintaining, po- 
sitions which require the highest degree of intellectual 
poise and keenness. It is quite unlikely that a man 
could reach the highest position in medicine, law, edu- 
cation, psychology, engineering, statesmanship, creative 
literature, industry, or finance, unless all his faculties 
functioned effectively and especially the finer, more 
elaborate, and more complicated ones. Of course, these 
men of distinction are a rigidly selected group, and they 102 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
may have been able to survive experiences which would 
have been disastrous to men of ordinary endowments. 
The soldiers at Miami and Syracuse may not have been 
so happily constituted by nature that they could suc- 
cessfully resist a toxic agent, as men who have attained 
distinction have been able to do. It is reasonable to 
suppose that a man must possess native endowments, 
physical as well as intellectual, above the average in 
order that he may achieve success in a higher degree 
than his associates in the same environment and under 
similar conditions. 
There is another possible explanation of the differ- 
ence in testimony given by different groups of men. 
The men of distinction felt under no compulsion to 
express conventional views regarding the effects of 
tobacco. There was nothing whatever to be gained by 
misrepresenting their experience. Being men of dis- 
tinction, they probably possess in an unusual degree 
independence of thought and judgment, and freedom 
from conventional constraint. They would, there- 
fore, be less influenced by traditional views than would 
the typical individual of average attainments. They 
have probably given an accurate and faithful statement 
of their experience with tobacco, so far as they have 
been able to analyze it. But the young men who tes- 
tified at Miami and Syracuse universities might very 
easily have been influenced in their responses by con- 
ventional beliefs regarding the evil effects of tobacco. 
They may have imagined that their teachers would wish THE VERDICT OF OBSERVATION 
103 
them to say that they thought the use of tobacco was 
harmful, rather than to say that they did not know 
whether it was or not, or that they thought it was ben- 
eficial. Those who have had much experience in 
securing responses from students know that every pre- 
caution has to be taken to prevent those who give 
testimony from shaping their statements so as to please 
the questioner, or to conform to the views current in 
the community. 
It is possible, and even probable, that the soldiers, 
taken as a whole, indulged in tobacco in excess of what 
men of distinction, taken as a whole, do. A soldier 
is not so conscious of the need of conserving his in- 
tellectual poise and keenness as men of affairs are, so 
that the soldier might not deny himself indulgence in 
tobacco, even if he suspected that it was taking the edge 
off from his mental faculties. He would not experi- 
ence penalties for weakened intellectual powers as 
would men in positions of great responsibility. So 
most of the soldiers might actually feel the detrimental 
effects of tobacco, whereas not more than four or five 
per cent of the men of distinction would be able to 
detect them; and both groups might be truthful in their 
testimony to the best of their knowledge and belief. 
Since mention has been made of the testimony of men 
in the S. A. T. C., a word should be said regarding the 
relation of tobacco to the efficiency of soldiers on the 
battle front. Letters were received by the writer from 
a number of officers of the American army, who had 104 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
charge of American soldiers in France during the late 
war. These officers, while reserved and guarded in 
their statements, are still of the opinion that tobacco 
proved of advantage to the soldiers in the trenches. 
Says one general: “When the men could smoke they 
seemed more contented and better able to endure hard- 
ship than when they were denied tobacco. Apparently, 
cigarettes or cigars would quiet the nerves of men who 
were preparing to undertake a dangerous task.” The 
officers do not attempt to explain just how tobacco in- 
fluences the psychological processes of the soldier, but 
they observed the results on their behavior, and they 
believe that when a man is at the front undergoing 
hardships and perils, tobacco is of some assistance to 
him. 
Military men at home and abroad, especially in Eng- 
land, have at different times said that the excessive use 
of tobacco was proving of disadvantage to soldiers in 
times of peace, and the writer recalls having read sev- 
eral newspaper interviews with military men during the 
war who maintained that it was a mistake for the gov- 
ernment and for patriotic associations to supply soldiers 
with tobacco so liberally as they were doing; but the 
writer cannot recall that definite evidence was given in 
these interviews showing that soldiers at the front were 
injured by the use of tobacco. One can believe that 
tobacco might prove to be a detriment to soldiers dur- 
ing peace, and at the same time be of service to them 
when they are engaged in war. There cannot longer be 
any doubt that for most persons, at any rate, tobacco THE VERDICT OF OBSERVATION 
105 
exerts a sedative influence upon the nervous system, in 
its secondary, if not in its initial effects. Ultimately, 
if not in the beginning, it renders one less sensitive to 
influences acting upon him than he was before its use. 
It tends to slow down cerebral activity, as shown es- 
pecially in Part III of this volume. If a person were 
undergoing disagreeable experiences in which he was 
irritated physically or mentally, or both, he would prob- 
ably, in the majority of cases, secure some measure 
of relief by smoking. Also, if he were apprehensive of 
approaching difficulties or dangers and he could not 
voluntarily control emotions of anxiety or fear, he 
might become less sensitive to possible harm by smoking 
a cigarette, a cigar, or a pipe. It is easy to understand, 
then, why the efficiency of a soldier undergoing physical 
and mental hardship would be increased by dulling his 
sensitiveness to his distress, either actual or antici- 
patory. Whether he would continue to derive benefit 
if he should use tobacco to reduce his sensitiveness to 
hardship and danger over a long period of years, one 
cannot tell. At least, the writer has been unable to 
secure any dependable evidence bearing upon this 
matter. 
Whether a soldier would become keener in the long 
run in devising ways and means of protecting himself 
from hardship and danger if he did not use tobacco, as 
compared with one who did use it, is a debatable ques- 
tion. The writer put this question to officers who had 
charge of men at the front, but not a single satisfactory 
answer was received. These officers believe that men 106 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
will endure actual hardship and will face danger more 
courageously if they smoke than if they do not smoke, 
but they have no positive opinion as to whether a sol- 
dier would show greater intellectual acumen in sur- 
mounting the obstacles in his environment over a period 
of years if he abstained from tobacco than if he used it. 
A further point should be kept in mind by the reader 
in considering the testimony of officers regarding the 
value of tobacco for men in the trenches. Men at the 
front are out in the open almost continually. They are, 
as a rule, engaged in arduous physical labor. Con- 
ceivably, they can eliminate the toxins derived from the 
use of tobacco, while a soldier in times of peace, living 
largely within doors, and not having much vigorous 
muscular exercise might not be able so fully to build 
resistance against tobacco toxins. Experiments con- 
ducted by Fisher have shown, and our own laboratory 
tests reported in Part III of this volume show, that 
tobacco reduces accuracy of marksmanship and steadi- 
ness of muscular control; but these tests were not made 
upon men who were living out in the open engaged in 
trench warfare. It cannot be stated positively that, 
because the accuracy and steadiness of men engaged in 
ordinary pursuits are reduced by tobacco, the same 
results would be experienced by soldiers at the front. 
Any reader of the testimonies presented in the pre- 
ceding chapters (III and IV) is bound to conclude, if 
he does not consider any other data, that the use of 
tobacco cannot be a detriment to the mental efficiency THE VERDICT OF OBSERVATION 
107 
of all men. So far as the records show, men who use 
tobacco have achieved as much in every field of activity 
as the men who do not use it. Some employers of men 
for intellectual tasks maintain that tobacco promotes 
efficiency, but there is at least an equal number of em- 
ployers who maintain that tobacco lessens efficiency. 
In this connection, the reader might reread the follow- 
ing testimonies that present directly contrary views: 
Authors A, B, and C, Group II (all three university 
presidents) ; Author A, Group VI (a leading states- 
man) ; Author I, Group IV; Author D, Group IX. 
The writer sent a personal letter to the director of 
personnel of a number of the largest industrial organ- 
izations in the United States, such as the United States 
Steel Corporation, the Standard Oil Company, the 
American Tobacco Company, Armour and Company, 
Swift and Company, the International Harvester Com- 
pany, the Anaconda Mining Company, the Pillsbury 
Company, the Chicago Tribune, the New York Times, 
the New York National City Bank, et al, asking 
whether any evidence was available which would show 
whether men who used tobacco were more or were 
less efficient in work requiring intellectual acumen than 
men who did not use it. Although all but three replied, 
not one of them offered evidence of conclusive value. 
They all said, in so many words, that they could not 
tell whether or not tobacco was a factor in the efficiency 
of the men whom they employed for positions demand- 
ing mental acumen and endurance. They had not in- 
vestigated the matter critically; and from such 108 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
observations as they had been able to make, there did 
not seem to be any difference in efficiency between the 
men who used tobacco and those who did not use it. 
It may be mentioned in passing, however, that a num- 
ber of the directors of personnel of these great indus- 
trial organizations stated that in their opinion the use 
of cigarettes by immature boys always lessens their 
efficiency; but it was apparent that they were speaking 
from the standpoint of traditional prejudice, since they 
had not secured accurate data on the subject. The 
same comment may be made on the statements offered 
by men of distinction, to the effect that while they can- 
not detect any ill effects of the use of tobacco on them- 
selves, still they think immature persons are injured 
by it. 
It should be kept in mind that the men who have 
given testimony in this investigation are not typical 
men. They are the fittest men in the fields in which 
they have specialized. There are multitudes of inferior 
men in every one of these fields. Has the use of to- 
bacco been a factor in keeping these other men inferior? 
So far as the writer knows, accurate data relating to 
this matter never have been and probably never can 
be secured, unless the life careers of men can be studied. 
In order to determine whether mediocre men in all these 
fields of activity owe their mediocrity to the effects of 
tobacco, it would be necessary to obtain an accurate 
measurement of their efficiency for a long period before 
they began the use of tobacco and compare this with THE VERDICT OF OBSERVATION 
109 
an accurate measurement of their efficiency during an 
equally long period while they were using tobacco; and 
all other factors and conditions would have to be kept 
uniform. Further, it would be necessary to compare 
the careers of groups of smokers and of non-smokers 
of equal native capacity in each field of activity; and 
tests would need to be applied to determine the mature 
capacity of the members of each group. It would 
doubtless prove of inestimable value if persons of 
leisure and large resources would undertake this her- 
culean task. 
Referring to the testimonies presented in preceding 
chapters, it may be asked,—Has tobacco aided the su- 
perior men to attain superiority, or has it retarded them 
in their progress and prevented them from accomplish- 
ing as much as they could have accomplished if they 
had not used tobacco? No one can answer this ques- 
tion. The smokers, with but few exceptions, say that 
tobacco has not hindered them. The literary men all 
say that they have been helped by tobacco. Even 
though psychological tests show, as they do (see Part 
III), that tobacco as a drug actually slows down in- 
tellectual processes to some extent, nevertheless there 
may be compensating factors which offset its disad- 
vantages and which may make it a beneficial agent for 
some persons. A man who derives pleasure from a 
cigar or pipe or cigarette may be able to accomplish 
more intellectually, despite a certain amount of dulling 
of his intellectual processes, than if he were deprived 110 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
of this pleasure. The advertisements of tobacco stress 
the point that its devotees gain great satisfaction from 
its use; and a smoker could hardly avoid being influ- 
enced in favor of it as a means of adding to the comfort 
of body and peace of mind, even though its intellectual 
and physiological effects might not actually increase 
bodily comfort and contentment in all instances. Then, 
an individual who believes as a result of suggestion 
that he has had a comforting experience when he has 
smoked a pipe is more ready to attack an intellectual 
task with vigor after he has finished his cigar or pipe 
or cigarette than he would be if he had not indulged. 
Again, many smokers believe that digestion is improved 
and the nervous system refreshed by smoking, and so 
they feel more fit to undertake tasks after a smoke than 
before it. Even if the tobacco should exert a toxic, and 
so a retarding, influence upon one’s intellectual func- 
tion, still the conviction that he has been helped might 
more than offset the harmful effect of the toxin. That 
is to say, if a man thinks that his cigar or cigarette or 
pipe is of service to him, as most smokers do, it may 
turn out to be a help, even though its direct action on 
intellectual processes may be harmful. 
Further, it is probable that some men are so consti- 
tuted nervously that under strain and stress they be- 
come tense and their tension acts as an inhibiting force 
upon intellectual activity. In such cases, tobacco may 
reduce sensitiveness to the situations that develop the 
tension and may relax tension already developed, so 
that retarding inhibition is reduced. Interviews with THE VERDICT OF OBSERVATION 
111 
university instructors have yielded evidence in support 
of this view. A distinguished scientist stated in an 
interview that the direct, immediate effect of tobacco 
was harmful in his intellectual work, but in the course 
of a day he was able to do more with less strain and 
tension when he could smoke occasionally than when he 
was deprived of tobacco. Many of the testimonies 
presented in Chapters III and IV emphasize this point 
in its general bearing. 
Undoubtedly habit plays a prominent role in respect 
to the effect of smoking upon intellectual work. When 
one has associated smoking with intellectual activity of 
any sort for a considerable period, he may, and he prob- 
ably does, establish a connection between smoking and 
intellectual effort, so that the latter becomes dependent 
upon the former, not so much by way of direct nervous 
excitation as by way of keeping intact a series of actions 
which have developed together and which have become 
indissolubly associated with each other. In the inter- 
views with smokers, it was found in every case that 
when one had become accustomed to light a cigar, 
cigarette, or pipe before beginning his work, he must 
now light a cigar, cigarette, or pipe before he can get 
started. Evidence in support of this view—that to- 
bacco becomes a necessity to one who has formed the 
habit of using it in connection with mental work—is 
found in the testimonies of many men of distinction, as, 
for instance, Author D, Group III; and Authors B and 
E, Group V. 112 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
A further factor of importance in this connection 
should be mentioned. It is conceivable that tobacco 
might have a toxic effect upon intellectual functions, 
but that as an offset to this an individual might think 
that in using it he was putting himself more fully into 
accord with social practice than if he did not use it, 
and so he might feel more confidence and ease in the 
performance of his tasks and work with less friction 
than if he abstained from tobacco. In interviews which 
the writer has had with smokers, they have frequently 
stated that they felt they were more masculine, and 
that they were better regarded by their fellows and felt 
more at home with them when they smoked than when 
they did not. 
Literary men, especially writers of fiction, appear to 
believe that tobacco is favorable to creative and pro- 
ductive mental activity. After having read statements 
to this effect from distinguished men of letters, the 
writer had interviews with a number of men who are 
engaged principally in literary work requiring creative 
imagination. All but three of them use tobacco freely, 
and most of them expressed the belief that they could 
not do work of as good quality as they have been doing 
if they should be deprived of their cigarettes, cigars, 
or pipes. The verbatim statement of one of these men 
will answer very well for all of them. He said: 
“Whenever I am working out a plot, I have my pipe 
in hand all the time. I often smoke all day long when 
I am thinking out my plan. If I could not smoke I 
could not create anything new, I am afraid. It seems THE VERDICT OF OBSERVATION 
113 
to me I have observed that men who do not smoke are 
commonplace and mechanical. They do not have much 
originality. I think you would find if you could look 
into the matter that those who have created really great 
literature have used tobacco. If tobacco should be 
prohibited as alcohol has been, I think we would suffer 
a lapse in creative literary activity. Tobacco and 
creative thinking go hand in hand.” 
The position taken by this man of letters certainly 
cannot be defended in the extreme form in which he 
presents it. It probably is true (see the testimonies in 
Group V, Chapter IV) that in our times most literary 
men and women of note—but not all of them—use 
tobacco; but Homer, Plato, Aristotle, Virgil, and all 
the other great literary men of ancient times did not 
have access to tobacco as an aid to creative activity; 
neither did Locke, Rousseau, Dante, nor Goethe. The 
world’s leading artists—Phidias, Raphael, Angelo, 
et al.—produced their great works before tobacco had 
been introduced into Europe. Civilization in all its 
aspects had been built before Raleigh made the English 
people acquainted with the “virtues” (or as some would 
prefer to have it, the “evils”) of tobacco. In view of 
what men and women achieved in every sphere of 
thought and action before tobacco came into use, how 
can any one maintain that the original and creative ac- 
tivities of the human mind are dependent upon the 
stimulus given by this narcotic? 
And still the man of letters quoted above and the 
men and women whose views are presented in Group 114 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
V may be quite right in respect to the role which to- 
bacco plays in their own creative activities. Psycholo- 
gists recognize types of minds that act precipitately or 
explosively. Ideas surge into the focus of conscious- 
ness, with the result that there is apt to be intellectual 
confusion. One who has such a type of mind might be 
helped in his intellectual processes if he could check his 
mental excitability, so that he could gain control of his 
ideas and organize them instead of being controlled by 
them. Now, tobacco might act as a depressant in such 
an individual’s brain, and so he might he helped to 
think through plots and plans. Any agent which would 
retard mental function might prove of assistance to 
this type of individual. 
There is a more probable explanation, however, of 
the benefit which men and women of letters say they 
derive from tobacco. When a man enters upon literary 
work to-day, he inherits the traditional belief that 
smoking and originality and cleverness in literary pro- 
duction are indissoluble. Wishing to attain distinction, 
he calls tobacco to his aid; if it has liberated the genius 
of men in the past, it will be of assistance to him as he 
is entering upon his career. And now his pipe or cigar 
or cigarette and his creative activity may have become 
practically inseparable. At the outset in a man’s career, 
creative activity may have occurred under the spur of 
ambition and necessity. But the writer had his pipe or 
cigar or cigarette in his mouth when he was thinking 
through his plots and plans. He attributed his success 
to tobacco, whereas it was probably due to ambition THE VERDICT OF OBSERVATION 
115 
and necessity. But he has now associated smoking and 
creative activity together, and the creative faculties will 
not function unless the pipe or cigar or cigarette is in 
hand or in mouth. PART II 
DATA DERIVED FROM SCHOOL 
AND COLLEGE RECORDS CHAPTER VI 
REPORTS FROM VARIOUS INVESTIGATORS 
A few superintendents and principals of public 
schools and an occasional college instructor have made 
more or less successful attempts to obtain statistical 
data bearing upon the question of the relation between 
tobacco and the intellectual work of pupils. The num- 
ber of pupils investigated has in all cases been rather 
limited, and it has not been possible in any of the in- 
vestigations to differentiate tobacco from a number of 
other factors that may have been operating together 
to influence the scholastic records of the pupils studied. 
The results of any one of these investigations, taken 
separately, could not be regarded as conclusive; but 
when viewed together, as they will be in this chapter, 
they are entitled to considerable confidence as indicat- 
ing the probable role which tobacco plays in the work 
of school and college. They are given with extreme 
brevity, mainly as introductory to chapters that follow. 
In 1907, Superintendent H. D. Hervey, of Malden, 
Massachusetts, published the results of an investigation 
of the effects of tobacco upon the pupils in his commu- 
nity, as follows: 
119 120 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
Smokers 
Non- 
Smokers 
Excellent in school work 
o 
15 
Good “ “ “ 
2 
14 
Fair “ “ “ 
12 
11 
Poor “ n “ 
26 
0 
Failed of promotion: 
Once 
8 
6 
Twice 
14 
1 
Three times 
8 
0 
Four times 
1 
0 
One pupil had double promotion 
once before smoking, but failed 
twice after beginning to smoke. 
Often sick 
10 
1 
Headache 
14 
1 
Sore eyes 
7 
0 
34 
22 
0 
Nervous 
1 
Dull 
24 
3i 
1 
Unable to think at times 
0 
Mentally dwarfed 
12 
0 
Incapable of sustained attention 
35 
0 
Poor memory 
26 
0 
Poor reasoning powers 
29 
1 
Weak of will 
32 
1 
Coward 
15 
0 
16 
0 
Degenerate 
7 
0 
Vulgar 
12 
0 
Influence bad 
15 
0 
Disobedient 
18 
1 
Disrespectful 
11 
0 
Truant 
16 
0 
Reviewing his data, Superintendent Hervey con- 
cludes: “Boys may use tobacco because they are 
physically and mentally weak and morally unsound, or 
they may become physically, mentally, and morally im- REPORTS FROM VARIOUS INVESTIGATORS 
121 
paired because they use tobacco, or each factor may be 
partly cause and partly effect. In any event, the results 
of this study would seem to indicate that a close con- 
nection exists between low mentality, physical weak- 
ness, moral delinquency, and cigarette smoking. If 
this be true, the cigarette, far from being the sign of 
manliness and of superior intelligence, should be re- 
garded as the badge of the physical weakling, the 
mentally incompetent, and the morally unsound.” 
Superintendent John M. Davis, of Menomonie, 
Michigan, reported in the March, 1914, issue of the 
Wisconsin Journal of Education that he had for seven 
years been making a close observation of six hundred 
school boys, and he had found that the non-smokers 
averaged from two per cent to ten per cent higher in 
scholarship than the smokers. A writer in the Pitts- 
burgh, Pennsylvania, School Bulletin for September, 
1909, stated that in a group of sixth-grade boys he had 
examined, the non-smokers had gained “almost two 
years in school work over the smokers.” An unsigned 
article in the American Magazine for November, 1910, 
gives the results of a study of the scholastic records of 
five hundred high-school boys, as follows: 
GRADES 
Age 
Smokers 
N on-smokers 
12 
73 
83 
13 
75 
90 
H 
73 
89 
15 
75 
84 
l6 
75 
87 
17 
68 
85 122 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
In an article entitled “The Use of Tobacco by School 
Children,” published in the West Virginia School 
Journal, September, 1910, the statement is made that 
“of 688 pupils using tobacco, but 31 were of grade 
age; 506 were from two to seven years over-age for 
the grades in which they were enrolled.” 
Superintendent P. L. Lord made an investigation 
of the work of four hundred boys, two hundred of 
whom smoked cigarettes and two hundred of whom 
abstained therefrom. Ten teachers observed these 
boys for several months, and reported as follows: 
Smokers 
Non-Smokers 
Nervous 
14 
1 
Impaired hearing 
13 
1 
Poor memory 
12 
1 
Bad manners 
16 
2 
Low deportment 
13 
1 
Poor physical condition 
12 
2 
Bad moral condition 
14 
0 
Bad mental condition 
18 
1 
Street loafers 
16 
0 
Out nights 
15 
0 
Careless in dress 
12 
4 
Not neat or clean 
12 
I 
Truants 
10 
0 
Low grades 
18 
3 
No promotion 
79 
2 
Over-age 
19 
2 
Untruthful 
9 
0 
Slow thinkers 
19 
3 
Poor workers 
17 
0 
Superintendent H. L. Smith, of Bloomington, In- 
diana, investigated the average age of smokers and 
non-smokers to the number of 950 in his schools, in- 
cluding elementary and high schools, and he reports: REPORTS FROM VARIOUS INVESTIGATORS 
123 
Grades 
Average age 
of smokers 
Average age of 
non-smokers 
Excess age 
of smokers 
i 
9-i 7 
7.58 
i-59 
2 
9.66 
8.5i 
I-I5 
3 
10.68 
9-36 
1.32 
4 
12.60 
10.55 
2.05 
s 
14.22 
12.21 
2.01 
6 
13-62 
12.42 
1.20 
7 
14.67 
13-32 
1-35 
8 
15.12 
14.65 
•47 
9 
16.47 
15.55 
-92 
10 
i6.75 
16.17 
-58 
ii 
18.00 
17.27 
•73 
12 
17-55 
17.22 
•33 
Superintendent Smith interprets his data as follows: 
1. Smokers are distinctly older than non-smokers, 
having failed in their work much more frequently. 
2. Smokers are doing distinctly poorer work than 
non-smokers. 
3. Smokers are disciplined much more frequently and 
for more serious offenses than the non-smokers are. 
Superintendent Smith also found that non-smokers 
failed in ten per cent of their work, occasional smok- 
ers in eighteen and seven tenths per cent, and 
habitual smokers in twenty-nine per cent of their work. 
Superintendent E. Morris Cox, of Oakland, Califor- 
nia, studied nine boys in his high school who were 
habitual smokers. He says: “The system of mark- 
ing gave five grades, from one for excellent work down 
to five for failure. The combined records of these 
boys throughout the four years at school show these 
grades: 1, o; 2, 38; 3, 66; 4, 53; 5, 54. An apportion- 
ment of the same number of records, in accordance 124 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
with records obtained by all students in the school is 
as follows: i, 20; <?, 81; 3, 67; 4, 27; 5, 16. Compari- 
son shows that nearly a half of all the records fall 
under the first two heads. These were considered very 
good records. Smokers had less than one fifth of 
their records there. The whole student body had one 
fifth of their records under four and five, the poor 
records. Smokers had half of their records under 
these two poor classes.” 
Mr. R. L. Sandwick, of the Deerfield High School, 
Highland Park, Illinois, has reported the results of an 
investigation in his school. The records of 156 boys 
who were in school and of 45 boys wno had left school 
were compared. 
77 had never smoked 
Average grade 
84-5 
24 had quit smoking 
80.5 
55 habitual smokers, in school.. 
76.0 
45 habitual smokers, quit school 
69.0 
The average of the grades of 
non-smokers was 
the ten 
highest 
90.9 
The average of the grades of 
smokers was 
the ten 
highest 
78.9 
Mr. T. W. Gosling, principal of the Hughes High 
School, Cincinnati, investigated the records of 103 
high-school boys. He worked out a table showing the 
rankings of the smokers and the non-smokers with re- 
lation to each other. He made five classes according to 
grade attained in school work, and he calculated what 
percentage of smokers and of non-smokers, taking the 
numbers of each group and the records made by all the REPORTS FROM VARIOUS INVESTIGATORS 
125 
students together, should be found in each class. His 
table is as follows: 
go% or 
above 
Upper Ys 
of class 
Upper y2 
of class 
Lower 
of class 
Failures 
Non-smokers 
Expected % 
56.3 
563 
56.3 
56.3 
56.3 
Actual % 
75-0 
61.9 
60.4 
52.0 
38.5 
Smokers 
Expected % 
43-7 
43-7 
43-7 
43-7 
43-7 
Actual % 
25.0 
38.1 
39-6 
48.0 
61.5 
Grades among the 
highest 5 
Grades among the 
lowest 6 
Smokers 
Expected % 
43 7 
437 
Actual % 
0.0 
100.0 
Non-smokers 
Expected % 
56.3 
56.3 
Actual °/o 
100.0 
0.0 
An investigation was recently made by Mr. Roy 
Dimmitt, principal of Ensley High School, Birming- 
ham, Alabama, to determine the relative standing in the 
formal school activities of smokers and of non-smokers 
in the Ensley High School. 
At the time the experiment was made there were 152 
boys in school. Of this number, 46, or about thirty 
per cent, were cigarette smokers. Some had been 
smokers for several years, with the habit firmly fixed, 
while others were just beginning. No distinction was 126 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
made between these, however, and all were classed as 
smokers. This may account to some extent for the 
closeness of the figures representing average grades. 
For comparison the boys are grouped according to 
scholarship, as follows: 
Group A consists of boys who passed in all subjects 
for the semester. (Unconditioned.) 
Group B consists of those who failed in one and not 
more than two subjects. (Conditioned.) 
Group C consists of those who failed in more than 
two subjects, and hence failed of promotion. (Failed.) 
Group D consists of those who, for various reasons, 
withdrew from school before the end of the semester. 
(Withdrawn.) 
Out of the twenty-five groups of data given below, 
twenty-four groups are decidedly in favor of the pupils 
who do not smoke cigarettes. This is true not only in 
respect to scholarship; it is equally true in respect to 
attendance, punctuality, and deportment. 
The investigation failed to show whether the 
smoking of cigarettes was the cause of inferiority 
among certain pupils, or whether a general weakness 
from other sources caused these pupils both to make 
low grades and to yield to the temptation of smoking. 
Mr. Dimmitt concludes that “the investigation dis- 
closed this fact, whatever may be the causes, that un- 
questionably the non-smokers, so far as this school is 
concerned, are the more desirable citizens in point of 
efficiency.” The data upon which Mr. Dimmitt bases 
his conclusions are as follows: REPORTS FROM VARIOUS INVESTIGATORS 
127 
Group A: Promoted Pupils 
Smokers 
Per cent 
N on-smokers 
Per cent 
In Group A 
26.1 
73-8 
Average days present (88 possible) .. 
81 
85 
Average days absent 
4 
0.89 
Average times tardy 
1.81 
0.9 
Average Deportment grade 
91 
92 
Average English grade 
72 
73-4 
Average Latin grade 
72 
73 
Average History grade 
76 
78 
Average Mathematics grade 
78 
87 
Average Science grade 
70 
83 
Average credit received 
4-5 
4.8 
Group B : Conditioned Pupils 
Smokers 
Per cent 
Non-smokers 
Per cent 
In Group B 
Si-3 
48.7 
Average days present (88 possible) .. 
74 
82 
Average days absent 
3-4 
2 
Average times tardy 
1.08 
0.76 
Average Deportment grade 
87 
85 
Average English grade 
61 
66 
Average Latin grade 
52 
55 
Average History grade 
63 
68 
Average Mathematics grade 
69 
72 
Average Science grade 
72 
79 
Average credit received 
3-2 
3-8 
Summary 
Smokers , 
Per cent 
N on-smokers 
Per cent 
In school, 152 
30.26 
6974 
In Group A (Promoted) 
26.1 
73-8 
In Group B (Conditioned) 
Si-3 
487 
In Group C (Failed) 
62 
38 
In Group D (Withdrawn) 
68 
32 128 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
Professor William McKeever, of Kansas, in an ar- 
ticle in the Industrialist, March 9, 1907, says: “Out 
of the many hundreds of tabulated cases in my posses- 
sion, several of the very youthful ones have been re- 
duced almost to the condition of imbeciles. Out of 
2,336 who were attending public school, only six were 
reported ‘bright students.’ A very few, perhaps ten, 
were ‘average’ and all the remainder were ‘poor’ or 
‘worthless’ students. The average grade of fifty 
smokers and fifty non-smokers was computed from the 
records of one term’s work in the Kansas Agricultural 
College, and the results favored the non-smokers with 
a difference of 17.5 on a scale of 100. The two groups 
represented the same class rank; that is, the same 
number of seniors, juniors, sophomores, and fresh- 
men.” 
Mr. E. L. Clark, in an article entitled “The Effect 
of Smoking on Clark College Students,” published in 
the Clark College Record for July, 1909, stated that 
“46.3 per cent of 201 students smoke. The smokers 
exceed the non-smokers a little in strength and lung 
capacity. Twenty-six per cent of the smokers won 
athletic insignia against 16 per cent of the non-smokers. 
Scholarship honors were won by 18.3 per cent 
of the smokers, against 68.5 per cent of the non- 
smokers.” 
In the Literary Digest for August 8, 1914, the state- 
ment is made that in fifty years at Harvard University 
not one tobacco user has stood at the head of his REPORTS FROM VARIOUS INVESTIGATORS 
129 
class, though five out of six Harvard students use 
tobacco. 
Dr. George H. Meylan, of Columbia University, 
made an examination of the records of 223 freshmen 
and sophomores, and he reported his findings in the 
Popular Science Monthly, in 1910. He found that 
fifty-two per cent of the students were smokers and 
forty-eight per cent were non-smokers. Their aca- 
demic records are as follows: 
Average 
entrance 
grade 
Average grade 
during the first 
two years 
Failures during 
the first 
two years 
Per cent 
223 students 
90 
66 
7 
113 smokers 
89 
62 
10 
no non-smokers 
9i 
69 
4 
Dr. Meylan thinks that the lower scholarship of the 
students who smoke is not due to the direct influence of 
tobacco, but the smokers loaf more than the non- 
smokers, and their idleness is the cause of their intel- 
lectual inferiority. 
Dr. Frederick J. Pack, of the University of Utah, 
stated in an article in the Popular Science Monthly in 
1912 that the scholastic standing of eighty-one smokers 
averaged 74.5, and of non-smokers, for the same num- 
ber, 79-4- He obtained records from several colleges 
and put them into the following comparative table: 130 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
Institution 
Grades of smokers 
Grades of non-smokers 
A 
65.2 
69.8 
B 
647 
74-6 
C 
78.8 
81.1 
B 
75-8 
77-6 
E 
84.6 
84.8 
F 
69.6 
71-3 
G 
74.0 
75-0 
H 
75-2 
794 
I 
81.6 
88.4 
J 
78.5 
81.3 
K 
74.0 
84.6 
L 
77-3 
77-6 
Of 81 smokers, 4 were among the best, 12 among the lowest. 
Of 101 non-smokers, 11 were among the best, 6 among the 
lowest. 
Dr. Jay W. Seaver, of Yale University, who made 
observations on Yale students for a series of years, 
reported in the Arena for February, 1897: “Out of 
our highest scholarship men only a small percentage, 
about five, use tobacco, while of the men who do not 
get appointments, about sixty per cent are tobacco 
users. The kind of mind that permits its user to be- 
come addicted to a habit that is primarily offensive 
and deteriorating is the kind of mind that will be 
graded low on general intellectual tests.” 
Dr. Arthur D. Bush subjected groups of medical 
students to tests, and the results, as published in the 
New York Medical Journal, 1914, indicate that the 
smoking of tobacco reduces the mental efficiency of the 
smokers ten and five-tenths per cent. A criticism of 
the method of investigation employed by Dr. Bush 
will be found in Part III, in which suggestion as REPORTS FROM VARIOUS INVESTIGATORS 
131 
a disturbing factor in the study of drug action is 
discussed. 
Baumberger and Martin, of the laboratory of physi- 
ology, Stanford University, have recently reported the 
results of an investigation of the effect of smoking upon 
the fatigue and efficiency of several men engaged in 
receiving and sending telegraphic messages by the 
Morse code. The investigators maintain that this is a 
strenuous mental occupation, since in order to perform 
efficiently, an operator must be able to give continuous 
concentrated attention. His memory must be depend- 
able, for he is constantly transposing dots and dashes 
into letters, or the reverse, and he is continually con- 
structing words and sentences. 
The investigation consisted in comparing the output 
of work during three days by a group of heavy smokers 
and a group of light smokers, all working under the 
same conditions. They worked nine hours each day. 
A man was regarded as a heavy smoker if he smoked 
cigarettes, pipes, or cigars incessantly when he was off 
duty, while a man was regarded as a light smoker if he 
smoked two or three cigarettes before work at noon or 
after work, or if he smoked two pipes or one cigar a 
day. There were seven heavy smokers and five light 
smokers. The data obtained by these investigators 
showed that the heavy smokers accomplished more than 
light smokers during the second and fifth hours of 
the day. The first hour they accomplished just as much 
as the light smokers. During the remaining six hours, 132 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
they accomplished less than the light smokers. From 
the sixth to the ninth hour the heavy smokers accom- 
plished much less than the light smokers, showing that 
they apparently became fatigued more easily. The 
achievement of the heavy smokers was distinctly less for 
the entire day than that of the light smokers. The in- 
vestigators concluded that heavy smokers are not as cap- 
able of sustained effort as light smokers, and they can- 
not react to increased pressure toward the latter hours 
of a working day as effectively as light smokers can do. 
Professor W. L. Holt, Director of the Department 
of Hygiene, the University of Tennessee, reported in 
School and Society for September 3, 1921, the results 
of a study of 231 freshmen, of whom 79 were smokers 
and 152 were non-smokers. He says: “The non- 
smokers’ average grade of 72.6 exceeds that of the 
smokers by 4.1. Much more important in this con- 
nection is the fact that no less than thirty per cent of 
the smoking freshmen failed in scholarship for the first 
term, or were conditioned (got below 65 for an aver- 
age), while only 1.3 per cent of the non-smokers failed 
or were conditioned. This means that over 90 per cent 
of the freshmen who failed the first term smoked, while 
only 27 per cent of those who passed smoked. The 
close connection between smoking and failing among 
freshmen is certain; the question is how far the smok- 
ing itself actually hinders the student and how often it 
is not the smoking itself but other unfavorable traits 
that are found much oftener in the smoker than in the REPORTS FROM VARIOUS INVESTIGATORS 
133 
abstainer, such as spending more time on athletics, 
social activities, and neglecting proper care of his body 
and mind. I am inclined to think the non-smokers as 
a class must have more self-control and a stronger 
character; must oftener come to college with a serious 
purpose and hence would succeed much better than the 
smokers, even if smoking did not interfere at all with 
mental activity. . . . 
“The honor list for both the freshman class and for 
the whole university shows nearly as striking an ad- 
vantage for the non-smokers, who claim 80 per cent, 
or 20 out of 25.” 
It is a significant fact that in every one of the fore- 
going reports, smokers are shown to be inferior to 
non-smokers in the work of school and college. 
Whether their inferiority is due to the direct effect of 
tobacco as a drug, or to other factors, or to all factors 
operating together, remains to be determined; but so 
far as these investigations reveal the facts regarding the 
role of tobacco in school and college, it is always asso- 
ciated with poor scholarship. CHAPTER VII 
TESTIMONY OF PRINCIPALS AND FACULTIES OF 
HIGH SCHOOLS 
One cannot escape the conviction that some of the 
investigations relating to the influence of tobacco on 
scholarship that have been reported show the effects in 
greater or less degree of prejudice, while others, those 
that appear in Chapter VI, for instance, seem to be 
entirely free from bias and preconception. The writer 
discussed these investigations with a number of high- 
school principals for the purpose, mainly, of deciding 
whether it would be possible for principals and facul- 
ties of high schools to conduct an unprejudiced inves- 
tigation in their respective schools in order to deter- 
mine whether the use of tobacco had any measurable 
effect, beneficial or otherwise, upon the intellectual 
work of pupils. The writer was particularly eager to 
learn whether the principals and faculties of high schools 
could measure the effects of tobacco as distinguished 
from pool rooms, dance halls, motion pictures, and 
other agencies upon the scholarship of pupils. As a 
result of these conferences, it was decided to ask a 
large number of principals and faculties of high schools 
to cooperate in this investigation. 
One thousand schools distributed through five states 
134 PRINCIPALS AND FACULTIES OF HIGH SCHOOLS 
135 
in the Middle West were selected for this inquiry. The 
principals and faculties of these schools were asked to 
make a study of the situation in their respective schools, 
following the plan outlined in a questionnaire which 
was designed to secure information in respect to the 
matters denoted by the following questions: 
1. How many boys in your school? 
2. What percentage of them smoke? 
3. Is the use of tobacco in any form by your pupils 
increasing, or is it decreasing ? 
4. What percentage of pupils who use tobacco are 
below the average in scholarship? Above 
the average? Below the average in deport- 
ment? Above the average? 
5. What percentage of tobacco users among the 
pupils have declined in scholarship since be- 
ginning the use of tobacco ? In deportment ? 
What percentage have improved in scholar- 
ship? In deportment? 
6. Please give evidence showing that the use of 
tobacco has influenced the intellectual work 
and deportment of pupils for better or for 
worse. If possible, attach hereto a brief 
report of the history of the work and deport- 
ment of individual cases before and after 
they began the use of tobacco. 
The writer has extensive acquaintance among high- 
school principals in the Middle West, and the schools 
chosen were those from which it was believed the most 
accurate data could be secured. A personal letter was 
written to each principal, with the view of impressing 136 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
upon him the importance of the investigation and the 
necessity of securing data free from bias and prejudice. 
Each principal was asked to trace the intellectual career 
of every pupil whose scholastic record was low, in order 
to discover if possible whether tobacco was a cause 
or the cause, or whether other agencies were respon- 
sible. 
Returns were secured from forty-five per cent of the 
schools selected for the investigation. All returns were 
carefully studied by the writer and his associates in 
this work. It was believed by all of us that some of 
the returns did not show careful, accurate, unbiased in- 
vestigation and they were discarded, for it was thought 
best not to consider the returns from any school if 
they appeared to be influenced by prejudice. After the 
elimination of all data which seemed to be biased, there 
were left returns from 206 schools which bore evidence 
of careful, unprejudiced, and impartial inquiry. 
The first question asked of all principals and facul- 
ties relates to the percentage of smokers in each school. 
The answers to this question show that of the 206 
schools, the returns from which are included in this 
report, there are three which have no smokers. In the 
remaining schools the total number of smokers ranges 
from 2 per cent to 95 per cent of the number of boys 
enrolled. The average percentage of smokers is 29.75. 
As to the form in which tobacco is used, cigarettes are 
the most popular. In all the schools but three there 
were cigarette smokers, while cigars were used in only PRINCIPALS AND FACULTIES OF HIGH SCHOOLS 
137 
56 per cent of the schools. In cases where both cigars 
and cigarettes were used, the number of cigarette 
smokers was usually much larger than the number of 
cigar smokers. In only seven schools did the number 
of cigar smokers exceed the number of cigarette 
smokers. The percentage of pipe smokers was very 
small in these schools. 
The answers to the third question show that in 45 
per cent of these schools there has been an increase 
during the past five years in the percentage of smokers. 
Thirty-six per cent of the schools report a decrease in 
the use of tobacco, while 19 per cent report no change 
noticeable in the percentage of smokers. 
It was the aim in the fourth question to determine 
the percentage of tobacco users who were above the 
median in all these schools and the percentage who 
were below, alike in scholarship and in deportment. In 
relation to the median for all schools, it was found that 
15.9 per cent of the smokers are above the median in 
scholarship; while 60.5 per cent are below. Twenty- 
one and three tenths per cent are above the median in 
deportment, while 59.2 per cent are below. 
The fifth question was designed to reveal whether 
smokers have improved or have declined in scholarship 
and in deportment since they began smoking. Sixteen 
and five tenths per cent of the smokers gained in schol- 
arship and 18 per cent gained in deportment since 
taking up the use of tobacco. Sixty-eight per cent 
declined in scholarship and 61.9 per cent declined in 
deportment since they began smoking. 138 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
The principals were requested to give brief reports 
on the work and behavior of individual boys before and 
after they began the use of tobacco. The following are 
typical of a large number of such reports: 
Pupil i. “A boy of considerable athletic ability and 
of more than average mental ability. His work in the 
elementary school was good. He entered high school 
as a non-smoker. The first year his average record 
was about 90. The second year he dropped a little, but 
was still doing good work. The third year a marked 
decline took place, for he closed the year with an aver- 
age of slightly less than 85. The fourth year he made 
a failure and averaged less than 80. He was known 
definitely to have been smoking the latter half of his 
third year. In his fourth year he used tobacco ex- 
cessively. He came from a good home, good church 
surroundings, and was well thought of in the commu- 
nity.” 
Pupil 2. “Comes from the best kind of home. The 
father and mother are both far above the average in 
general intelligence. A sister is a trained nurse of 
exceptional ability. The first year in high school he 
did good work. He began smoking about the end of 
the first year. Since then he has deteriorated and is 
doing work which will not average above 75.” 
Pupil j. “Comes from a family of athletic fellows— 
several boys. An older brother was an exceptionally PRINCIPALS AND FACULTIES OF HIGH SCHOOLS 
139 
strong student in high school and he graduated with 
honors. C’s record in graded school was excellent. He 
was considered to be a non-smoker during the first two 
years in high school, with an average standing of 90 
the first year and 87 the second. The third year he 
began smoking and dropped below 85. This year he 
is doing even poorer than that. He is not a fiend, but 
has used cigarettes moderately for the last two years.” 
Pupil 4. “Very bright in the grammar school. 
Began smoking while in the eighth grade. He has been 
in high school two years, but he is still ranked as fresh- 
man. He is listless, careless, nervous, pale, and emaci- 
ated. He is a cigarette fiend. His deportment is below 
normal.” 
Pupils 5, 6, and 7. “Three smokers in our high 
school. One of these has smoked for several years and 
he is the brightest and best all-round scholar we have. 
The others are just medium in their work. Deportment 
is good in all cases. These are cases of moderate 
smoking.” 
Pupil 8. “One boy whom I have studied and ob- 
served for several years began smoking in the seventh 
or eighth grade. This boy graduated as ‘honor’ student, 
took up the study of medicine in Northwestern Medical 
College, graduated with high standing, and is at this 
time a member of the faculty of his Alma Mater. And 
I suspect he is still a smoker.” 140 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
Pupils 9 and io. “Two brothers of the same school. 
Boy No. i led his classes throughout his four years 
in high school. After graduation he spent two years 
in the university, then entered a school of dentistry, 
graduated therefrom, and is now practicing in one of 
our thriving cities. He never smoked. . . . Boy 
No. 2 graduated from high school at the foot of the 
class, having to be ‘pushed’ or ‘pulled’ through some 
subjects, while in others his work was average. After 
graduation from high school, he entered a course in 
pharmacy, completing the course with good standing 
and is now holding down a position requiring more 
than ordinary ability, with perfect satisfaction to his 
employers. He smoked in the ‘alley’ from an early age, 
finally coming out in the open with his smoking. His 
moral nature was decidedly below the standard of 
No. i.” 
Pupil ii. “A boy of ability, above the average. He 
did excellent work as a freshman. He began using to- 
bacco at the close of the first year, and continued its 
use throughout high school. There was a marked de- 
cline in the quality of his work; he failed repeatedly 
in certain subjects, and finally graduated with grades 
that merely passed him.” 
Pupil 12. “A boy of average ability. He did good 
work the first semester in high school. He began the 
use of tobacco the second semester and declined in 
scholarship and deportment, and as a sophomore he PRINCIPALS AND FACULTIES OF HIGH SCHOOLS 
141 
failed completely. He finally withdrew from school 
without graduating.” 
Pupil jj. “A boy of average ability, began the use 
of tobacco during his first year. Afterwards he was 
an absolute failure, not passing in any work. He was 
irregular in attendance; his word could not be depended 
upon; he was discourteous to teachers and fellow stu- 
dents. He was even laughed at by the other students 
because of queer actions and remarks.” 
Pupil 14. “Boy exceptionally bright in the grades 
and in the first year of high school, but in the second 
year his work began to decline. On investigation it was 
found that he had started smoking in the latter part 
of his freshman year, and during the summer months 
he had fixed the habit on himself. He finished school 
at the tail end of his class.” 
Pupil 15. “In the eighth grade, before he started 
smoking, he led his class. Now as a junior he is near 
the bottom of the class. He started smoking as a 
freshman.” 
Pupil 16. “He did good work in his freshman year. 
He began smoking in his sophomore year. He failed in 
his work in junior year and dropped out of school at 
the beginning of his senior year.” 
Pupils 17 and 18. “Pair of twins—I have observed 
them from the seventh grade until now, when they are 142 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
seniors in high school. Both started using cigarettes a 
year ago, one more liberally than the other. Until last 
year the two boys averaged within one or two points 
of each other in every subject. To our surprise, the 
one who has smoked most is now from eight to ten 
points below his past average. The other is averaging 
two or three points better than before, but this I am 
inclined to attribute to the fact that he was married 
early last summer, and is back in school by the board’s 
special permission in order to graduate next spring.” 
Pupil ip. “Began smoking soon after he entered 
high school. His grades are as follows: First year 
average, 83.5; second year average, 78.5; third year 
average, 77.7; fourth year average, 68.7.” 
Pupil 20. “A sophomore; had marks above 85 last 
year. During the summer he took to smoking. Now 
his highest mark is 81, and he has failed in two sub- 
jects so far.” 
Pupil 21. “A junior. He began his career in high 
school by getting 90’s during his first year. He began 
smoking in his sophomore year. He has failed in two 
studies this year and has lost ‘pep’ and attention to 
work. He needs disciplining continually.” 
Pupil 22. “Last year M was a good student, 
got his lessons at one reading and made a good record. 
Last summer he began smoking moderately. This year PRINCIPALS AND FACULTIES OF HIGH SCHOOLS 
143 
there has been a decided drop in his standings, and a 
considerable increase in effort required to get his work.” 
Pupil 23. “A senior, began smoking in sophomore 
year, who has shown each year less interest in his work 
until this year he will be unable to make his grade. He 
began in his freshman year at the head of his class. 
In the grades he made a splendid record. He gave 
pract::„”y no trouble in the grades and early high 
school; but during the last two years he has been a 
continual problem in discipline.” 
Pupil 24. “A leader of his class until he began using 
tobacco; and as the habit grew on him, he became less 
interested and efficient in his school work, fell to the 
bottom of his class, and finally dropped out of school.” 
Pupil 25. “Began smoking in his junior year. 
Average in all studies in his freshman year, 86; sopho- 
more year, 87; junior year, 85; this year up to the 
present, 80.” 
Pupil 26. “On entering high school he was un- 
usually bright and dependable. This year he is a senior 
and is barely making passing grades. He has become 
willful, disobedient, and dishonest, due, I believe, to 
the use of cigarettes. His two brothers do not use to- 
bacco in any form and are leading in studies, athletics, 
and all school activities.” 
Pupil 27. “One boy, seventeen years old, son of one 
of the finest families in town, began the use of ciga- 144 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
rettes when he was about ten. He is now a weakling, 
the size of a ten-year-old boy, and incapable mentally 
and physically. Yet his brothers and sisters are well 
developed mentally and physically, and he enjoys all 
the privileges of a very comfortable home, and all gen- 
eral influences surrounding him are good.” 
Pupil 28. “Before he began to smoke he was bright, 
vivacious, acquisitive. Since he began he is dull, in- 
different, has lost interest, and has to be stimulated to 
study.” 
Pupil 29. “A fine lad originally; can still accomplish 
enough to keep going, but is only a shadow of what 
he should be. He cannot be trusted, will take advan- 
tage whenever he can, and has grown to enjoy low 
types of entertainment.” 
Pupil 30. “An exemplary lad through the last three 
years of high school. Began smoking the last year. 
He is said to have been drinking some in connection 
with his cigarette smoking. He is in his first year in 
college now and is a heavy smoker; he is failing in his 
work. He says he is moody and depressed and is very 
unhappy.” 
Pupil 37. “A boy of ability, above the average; did 
excellent work as freshman in high school. He began 
using tobacco at the close of the year and continued its 
use throughout the high school. A marked decline took PRINCIPALS AND FACULTIES OF HIGH SCHOOLS 
145 
place in the quality of his work; he failed repeatedly 
in subjects and finally graduated with grades that 
merely passed him.” 
Pupil 32. “A boy of average ability, did good work 
the first semester in high school; began using tobacco, 
declined in scholarship and deportment, and as a sopho- 
more failed completely. Finally withdrew from school 
without graduating.” 
Pupils 33, 34, 35. Summary of report on three 
boys: “We have three boys who did good work in 
school, both intellectual and physical, before they ac- 
quired the tobacco habit. Their work has declined 
since and they are failures in school work now.” 
Pupils 36, 37, 38, 39. Summary of report on four 
boys: “Four boys in our school when they were fresh- 
men were above the average in scholarship and deport- 
ment, but in their sophomore and junior years they 
grew indifferent and careless, and did not possess the 
mental alertness and agility they had as freshmen. The 
reason can be traced to the use of cigarettes.” 
Summary of report on boys in a large high school: 
“There is no doubt in my mind that the use of tobacco, 
especially cigarettes, is detrimental to the mental work 
of the boys of this school, as well as of any other 
school. I have observed the deportment of boys who 
smoke and I find that most of them are morose, self- 
esteemed, and stand on their so-called constitutional 146 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
rights—that it is nobody’s business and they have a 
perfect right to do as they please in any matter. I have 
also noticed that certain boys, immediately after they 
have been indulging in a cigarette are inclined to be 
uppish, disagreeable, and kind of ‘bull-doggish’ and 
are unable to listen to reason. Under these conditions 
they are hard to deal with.” 
Pupils 40, 41, 42, 42, 44. Summary of report on 
five boys: “Five boys in this school who were all above 
88 in all their studies before they began smoking are 
now down in all their work. One is failing in all his 
studies, two are below 80, and the other two are be- 
tween 80 and 85.” 
One cannot go over the reports from these two hun- 
dred and six schools without forming the conviction 
that tobacco is either directly or indirectly playing a 
tragic role in the high school. There is no evidence of 
bias or prejudice in the returns from most of these 
schools; at any rate the principals and faculties were 
aware of the danger that preconceived notions might 
distort their views, so that they were on their guard. 
And if they erred at all it was probably in the way of 
leniency in estimating the intellectual status of smokers 
in their schools. Some at least of the principals who 
made returns are personally friendly toward tobacco, 
so far as its use by adults is concerned. The writer 
knows that a considerable number of the principals and 
the superintendents of the schools from which returns PRINCIPALS AND FACULTIES OF HIGH SCHOOLS 
147 
were secured use tobacco themselves. In personal in- 
terviews they informed the writer that they enjoyed a 
cigar and believed that a moderate use of tobacco was 
not harmful to them physically or mentally. But they 
could not overlook the fact that the records of the 
smokers in their schools were conclusive in showing 
that the use of tobacco by pupils is detrimental to in- 
tellectual effort, and in extreme cases it paralyzes 
mental activity. 
The principals and faculties who cooperated in 
making this investigation in the high schools are well- 
balanced and well-trained persons. They are probably 
not as much inclined as most people to form hasty, 
superficial conclusions in respect to so important a 
matter as the forces that are operating against the 
success of their efforts in the schoolroom. Prin- 
cipals and faculties are constantly studying the situa- 
tions which help or hinder them in the management 
of their classes and their schools. They are trying to 
discover and combat agencies that prevent them from 
securing the attention of their pupils and make it im- 
possible for pupils to use their talents to the best 
advantage. Every year the writer attends many con- 
ventions of principals and teachers, and he listens to 
discussions of matters having to do with making in- 
struction in the schools effective, and he knows that 
the majority at least of principals and teachers are 
earnestly and sincerely seeking to determine what 
agencies are operating upon their pupils to distract their 
attention and lure them from their studies. The re- 148 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
ports, then, of the principals and faculties of the two 
hundred and six schools are entitled to serious consid- 
eration. This does not mean that there is no prob- 
ability of error in the data that are presented in this 
chapter, but the error is as likely to be in favor of 
tobacco as against it. CHAPTER VIII 
THE VERDICT OF SCHOOL AND COLLEGE RECORDS 
It was said in the preceding chapter that in the tes- 
timony of high-school faculties the influence of tobacco 
on the scholastic records of pupils was not in all cases 
rigidly differentiated from the influence of other 
agencies, such as pool halls, motion pictures, and so on. 
It was determined, therefore, to secure from high- 
school students a detailed statement respecting various 
habits—smoking, visiting pool halls and motion picture 
theaters, dancing, drinking coffee and tea, eating candy, 
and chewing gum—which might play a part in influenc- 
ing their intellectual work. It should be emphasized 
that the use of tobacco is only one of a number of 
habits, all of which, it was thought, might play a role 
in affecting a pupil’s school activities. For the inves- 
tigation of this matter a questionnaire was prepared 
after personal conferences with pupils in the Madison, 
Wisconsin, High School. Before it was printed it 
was submitted to a number of high-school principals 
for their suggestions and criticisms. It was designed 
that every boy in a cooperating high school should fill 
out a questionnaire, and that his academic record from 
the fourth year of the primary school down to the time 
when he gave his testimony should be transcribed and 
attached to the questionnaire containing an account of 
149 150 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
his present habits and the point in his scholastic career 
when he began to indulge in each habit. 
The cooperation of the superintendents, principals, 
and teachers in thirty cities throughout the country 
was solicited. A personal letter, explaining the pur- 
pose, extent, and character of the investigation was 
sent to each superintendent in these cities. All but 
three expressed a willingness to cooperate. As it 
turned out, however, it was impossible to secure com- 
plete and accurate data in thirteen of the cooperating 
cities, and so the investigation was abandoned sooner 
or later in these places. The chief obstacle in the way 
of securing reliable returns from these cities lay in the 
fact there was no clear record of the scholastic work 
of pupils from the fourth grade on into the high school. 
It was thought inadvisable to use in the investigation 
any record which was not complete from the primary 
school up to the time when the questionnaire was filled 
out. In the returns from two cities it was apparent that 
many of the boys did not give testimony conscientiously 
and so the returns from these cities were discarded. 
No questionnaire was considered which did not give 
evidence on the face of it of having been answered 
honestly. 
In presenting the questionnaire to the boys in every 
high school, care was taken to have them understand 
that the information they were asked to furnish was 
desired for scientific purposes solely. The following 
instructions were sent to each cooperating superintend- 
ent: THE VERDICT OF SCHOOL RECORDS 
151 
The questionnaire should be filled out by all the boys 
in the school at the same time. They should be given 
to understand clearly that none of the information will 
be used against them in any way whatsoever. Their 
names are necessary only for the purpose of transcrib- 
ing their school records. The questionnaire should be 
presented by some one who the boys know will not use 
the information to their detriment, and in whom the 
boys have complete confidence. Every question should 
be answered as accurately as possible. Accuracy is 
absolutely essential to the validity of this investigation. 
When the returns came in from each school they 
were studied by the writer and his assistants with a view 
to determining whether the information received was 
accurate and adequate for the purposes of this investi- 
gation. As intimated above, all questionnaires inade- 
quately or apparently inaccurately or dishonestly an- 
swered were discarded. After all eliminations had been 
made, there remained a few over two thousand cases, 
in each of which the data requested in the question- 
naire were supplied accurately, and there was attached 
a record of the scholastic work of the pupil from the 
fourth grade up to the time when the questionnaire was 
filled out. 
As a test of the accuracy of the reports of standings 
which were received, about 70,000 school records were 
examined and plotted. The curve showing the results 
is presented in Chart I. It will be seen that it conforms 
very closely to the so-called normal curve of distri- 
bution, and it may be concluded that the data used in CHART I General Distribution of Standings of High-School Boys 
Each dot represents the average of the standings of one hoy. About 70,000 standings are included in this chart. 
General Median, 83 31/38 
Standings 
No. of Boys 
1 
1 
72 .... 
4 
6 
74 
6 
20 
21 
32 
78 
76 
70 
86 
74 
36 
69 
90 
45 
32 
30 
25 
94 
9 
1434 
152 THE VERDICT OF SCHOOL RECORDS 
153 
calculating the effect of tobacco on school work are 
as accurate as data of this character can be made. 
As a check on the accuracy of the data furnished by 
the boys, they were asked to give the color of their 
hair and eyes, and the correlation between these data 
and scholarship was determined. Previous investiga- 
tion had shown that there is no measurable correlation 
between color of eyes or of hair and the intellectual 
work of pupils; that is, color of hair or of eyes exerts 
no appreciable influence upon mental activity. If the 
boys who supplied the data for this investigation an- 
swered accurately the questions asked them, then the 
correlation between the color of their hair (light or 
dark) and the color of their eyes (light or dark) and 
their scholastic record, no matter whether they were 
smokers or non-smokers, would be approximately o. 
As a matter of fact, it was found to be +.03 in respect 
to color of eyes, and —.10 in respect to color of hair, 
which means that the correlation is so slight in both 
cases as to be negligible. It may be reasonably inferred, 
then, that the boys whose answers were used furnished 
reliable data. 
Again, in order to determine whether smokers were 
inferior or superior to non-smokers in high schools in 
natural intelligence, as revealed in intelligence tests, 
such tests were given to all the boys in the high schools 
of Newton, Iowa, Macomb, Illinois, and Madison and 
Stoughton, Wisconsin. The Thorndike tests, E and D, 
the Otis tests, and the Army (Alpha) tests were used. 154 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
With the Thorndike tests the boys who had never 
smoked scored an average of 63.89. The boys who 
had once smoked but who had not smoked for six 
months before the tests were given scored an average 
of 73.39. The smokers at the time the tests were given 
scored an average of 66.76. With the Otis tests the 
smokers scored an average of 135.87, and the non- 
smokers an average of 118.96. With the Army tests 
the smokers scored an average of 107.76, and the non- 
smokers an average of 94.25. The results show as 
conclusively as intelligence tests can show that the 
smokers, taken as a group, are not inferior to the 
non-smokers, in native intelligence, but if anything they 
are superior to them. Whatever differences, then, are 
found in the standings of these groups must be due to 
environmental forces operating upon them, and not to 
hereditary differences in intelligence, although in view 
of the results of the intelligence tests one would expect 
that the smokers would score higher than the non- 
smokers. 
In calculating the relation between smoking and 
scholarship, the first step consisted in transferring the 
data gained from the questionnaires to filing cards 
which could be easily manipulated. Then the cards 
were grouped so that all the boys who had gained in 
scholarship since entering the high school were placed 
in one group, and all those who had lost in scholarship 
were placed in another group. The division in schol- 
arship periods was made between the grammar school THE VERDICT OF SCHOOL RECORDS 
155 
and the high school because it was found that most of 
the smokers began smoking during the latter part of 
the eighth grade, or early in the freshman year of the 
high school, although a few began earlier and a few 
later than this. Next, the number of smokers and of 
non-smokers in each group was determined. Then re- 
course was had to the method of association in ascer- 
taining the relation or correlation existing between 
tobacco and scholarship. Any reader who is interested 
in the technical method (too technical to be 
discussed in this place) of calculating the relation or 
“correlation,” if any exists, between two traits or 
series of phenomena should consult Whipple’s “Man- 
ual of Mental and Physical Tests,” pages 36-49. It 
will be enough to say here that if a causal relation 
exists between a “subject” and a “relative” it is pos- 
sible to calculate with considerable accuracy the amount 
of that relation, if one has a sufficient number of cases 
involving the subject and the relative, by the use of 
formulae that have been worked out and tested by 
mathematicians and statisticians. 
Treating the two thousand pupils, smokers and non- 
smokers, in the manner indicated, the results reveal a 
correlation between smoking and scholarship of —.51. 
This means that smoking exerted a detrimental influ- 
ence upon the scholarship of a large proportion but not 
all of the pupils whose records were examined. If 
every pupil who used tobacco had lost in scholarship, 
while every abstainer had gained, the correlation be- 
tween smoking and scholarship would have been —1.00. 156 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
If as many had gained as had lost in the case of both 
smokers and non-smokers the correlation would have 
been o. If every smoker had gained while every ab- 
stainer had lost, the correlation would have been +1.00. 
A correlation of —.51 between smoking and scholar- 
ship indicates antagonism of a serious nature between 
the two; they are incompatible in marked degree. And 
the depressing factor is undoubtedly smoking, for the 
reason that the standings of smokers in the early years, 
before tobacco became a factor in their intellectual 
operations, were as high as the standings of non- 
smokers. Besides, the performance of the smokers in 
the intelligence tests was at least equal to that of the 
non-smokers, so that the decline of the former in 
scholarship cannot be explained on the grounds of in- 
ferior natural mental powers. 
It should be noted that smoking is associated with 
other practices that affect scholarship—visitations to 
pool halls and motion pictures, the use of coffee and 
tea, chewing gum, and eating candy. But it has been 
found that non-smokers indulge in these pastimes and 
dissipations, though not quite so generally in regard to 
pool halls, as do smokers. It is conceivable that to- 
bacco addiction leads to addiction in other self- 
indulgent and intellectually depressing ways, or it may 
be the other way around; but allowing for the detri- 
mental influence of all these addictions operating with 
tobacco, there is still left an important measure of 
harmful effect which must be due to tobacco alone. THE VERDICT OF SCHOOL RECORDS 
157 
The effect of each and all these other agencies, con- 
sidered separately from tobacco, will be presented in 
studies to be published later, but it may be said here 
that tobacco is unquestionably the chief depressing fac- 
tor of them all. 
In Chart I are shown the averages of all the stand- 
ings secured in all studies by 1,434 boys, including 
smokers and non-smokers. In Charts II and III are 
shown the averages of standings secured by smokers 
after they began smoking. It can be seen that to- 
bacco exerts a depressing influence upon school work, 
the depressing influence increasing according as the 
amount of tobacco consumed increases. 158 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
CHART II 
Distribution of Standings of Boys Who Smoke the Equiva- 
lent of Five Pipes per Week, if One Cigar or Eight 
Cigarettes Equal One Pipe 
General Median, 82.375 
Standings 
66 — 
70 — 
— No. of Boys 
— .. 2 
74 — • • 2 
— 4 
— . 1 
78 — 9 
— 6 
— 9 
— 13 
82 — 11 
— 10 
— 12 
— 8 
86 — . . . 3 
— • • • 3 
— . 1 
— .. 2 
90 — . 1 
94— • 1 
— 101 THE VERDICT OF SCHOOL RECORDS 
159 
CHART III 
Distribution of Standings of Boys Who Smoke the Equiva- 
lent of Ten Pipes per Week 
General Median, 81.857 + 
Standings 
66 — 
70 — 
— No. of Boys 
— . . 2 
74— • • 2 
78 — 5 
— .. 2 
— . . . 3 
— 7 
82 — * 5 
— .. 2 
— 4 
— . .. 3 
86— . 1 
— . 1 
90 — . 1 
— . I 
— . I 
94— — 
— 40 PART III 
DATA DERIVED FROM THE 
PSYCHOLOGICAL LABORATORY CHAPTER IX 
THE PROBLEMS IN LABORATORY INVESTIGATION 
It may be that some readers who have gone through 
the preceding chapters have already reached a con- 
clusion regarding the effect of tobacco upon intellectual 
processes. Many persons are satisfied with such evi- 
dence relating to matters of this kind as has been 
presented in the chapters dealing with the habits of men 
of the past, the testimonies of men and women of 
distinction, the views of superintendents, principals, 
and teachers, and data derived from school records. 
Probably the majority of persons are determined in 
their beliefs respecting the good or ill effects of vari- 
ous practices upon human life by the outcome of the 
indulgence or abstinence of their acquaintances. In 
respect to tobacco, such persons readily conclude that 
it is not detrimental, but rather beneficial, if they know 
a few men who are smokers and who enjoy good health 
and who also have achieved or are achieving success 
in their business or profession. On the other hand, 
they just as readily conclude that tobacco is harmful 
to mental efficiency if they know a few men who use 
it and who are not in good health, or who are rated 
as mediocre men in their business or professional life. 
163 164 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
If there are persons of this type of mind who have 
read the foregoing chapters, they are probably now 
asking, “Why is it necessary to go any farther in the 
discussion of the relation of tobacco to mental effi- 
ciency? The case has been proved and no further 
evidence is required.” Some of the writer’s colleagues 
who have examined the evidence in the preceding chap- 
ters have said that it is final so far as their belief is 
concerned. They are convinced that tobacco slows 
down intellectual processes among high-school pupils, 
but that it may be indulged in by some adults without 
detriment to mental efficiency. 
A large proportion of people are not so easily con- 
vinced. Probably some of those who have examined 
the data presented in Parts I and II of this volume be- 
lieve that while the evidence gained from school records 
and the testimonies of principals and high-school fac- 
ulties, together with the testimonies and habits of men 
and women of the past and present, is of high value and 
might determine one’s action if no further evidence 
were available, still they feel that the problems involved 
are so complicated that in order to form an accurate 
opinion concerning them they must be analyzed and 
each component element studied by itself. The writer 
belongs to this latter group of persons. From the in- 
ception of and throughout the present investigation, he 
has felt that there are so many factors operating to 
determine the effect of tobacco on intellectual processes 
that no definite conclusion regarding the matter can be 
reached unless these factors can be differentiated from THE PROBLEMS IN LABORATORY INVESTIGATION 
165 
one another and each subjected to careful scrutiny. It 
is manifestly impossible to accomplish this satisfactorily 
merely by a review of biographical literature or by a 
study of the testimonies of men and women regarding 
the effect of tobacco upon their own mental activities. 
While occasionally a principal of a school has the facil- 
ities to analyze complicated problems of this sort, and 
study each of the factors involved, still most principals 
and teachers reach decisions respecting the outcome of 
forces influencing the work and behavior of their 
pupils without rigid differentiation of the various fac- 
tors which play a role in determining the outcome; and, 
of course, this method is adequate for their special 
needs. 
The ’verdict of school records taken over a long 
period is conclusive so far as the question concerning 
the relation of tobacco to mental efficiency as a whole 
is concerned; but these records are generalizations pre- 
senting in a single symbol the results of complex 
agencies acting together. If twenty-five pupils who 
smoke receive an average grade of 70 throughout their 
high-school course, while twenty-five pupils who do not 
smoke receive an average grade of 80, a principal and 
his teachers would conclude that smoking is a detri- 
ment to scholarship; but just why it is a detriment, and 
exactly what happens to the intellectual activities of a 
pupil who uses tobacco, remain obscure. The term 
“mental efficiency” refers to a very complex phenom- 
enon. Efficiency, or the lack of it, does not depend 166 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
upon the degree of health or vigor of a single mental 
function. If an agent, as tobacco, operates to reduce 
or to increase mental efficiency, the reason may be 
that it interferes with, or improves, a special function, 
or it may interfere with, or improve, a number of 
functions or all functions. If a pupil has received an 
average of 70 throughout his high-school period, it 
may be that he has been working at a low level in re- 
spect to all his mental functions; or it may be that one 
or two functions especially involved in school work 
have been unfavorably affected, with the result that he 
has achieved only inferior success during his school 
career; whereas, if he had engaged in some different 
activity, it is conceivable that he might have achieved 
a higher degree of success than he did in his academic 
work. 
Again, it is impossible to determine from the habits 
and the testimonies of men and women and the experi- 
ences of principals and teachers and even from the 
records of school work, whether tobacco exerts a direct 
effect as a drug upon intellectual functions, quickening 
them or slowing them down, as the case may be; or 
whether it exerts a neutral effect directly, but a positive 
effect socially. Mental efficiency depends not only upon 
intellectual activities as such, but also upon the environ- 
ing, and especially the social, conditions under which 
these activities occur. Conceivably, one’s intellect 
might function keenly, readily, and accurately in solv- 
ing a problem when one is among his friends, whereas 
it might function less readily, accurately, and keenly THE PROBLEMS IN LABORATORY INVESTIGATION 
167 
when one is among his enemies; or it might be the 
other way around. Introspection confirms observation 
and experimentation to the effect that environmental 
conditions exert an important influence upon intellec- 
tual functions. There is a widespread belief that if one 
drinks a cup of tea or coffee he will be cheered and his 
intellectual activity will be increased and fortified; but 
this effect might occur if one should drink tea with 
friends, even if the tea exerted no effect as a drug upon 
intellectual functions. The fact that one is doing what 
his friends are doing, and that the occasion betokens 
friendliness, good will, assurance of peace and protec- 
tion in the future, will be likely to result in improved 
mental activity. 
On the other hand, if one were placed in an environ- 
ment where he was apprehensive of the future, and if 
he felt that he was not in accord with the people about 
him, and that they were not in sympathy with him and 
did not approve of his personal traits, his beliefs, or 
his conduct, he probably would not or could not resist 
the distracting and depressing influence of these con- 
ditions, and so he could not concentrate his mind as 
a unit upon the problems of his profession, or upon his 
work in school if he were a pupil. He might be rated 
low in efficiency, and the reason might be that envi- 
ronmental factors slowed down his intellectual pro- 
cesses; there might be no direct interference with his 
intellectual functions, but the outcome in efficiency 
would be the same as though there had been such direct 
interference. 168 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
It was intimated in a preceding chapter that little 
had been done in the way of studying the direct effect 
of tobacco as a drug upon each of the intellectual func- 
tions. The results of three or four studies have been 
reported, and these may be briefly indicated. Professor 
Johnson, of the University of Idaho, has reported the 
results of a laboratory investigation which he made 
upon students during the year 1916-1917. First, he 
selected twenty men, ten of whom were abstainers from 
tobacco, four of whom smoked in moderation, and six 
of whom were addicts of tobacco, in the sense that they 
had become habitual smokers. These twenty men were 
subjected to three different series of tests on Friday 
afternoons for a number of weeks. It was the aim to 
have the tests equal in difficulty and of precisely the 
same character. The plan of procedure was to deter- 
mine the effect of tobacco upon the performance of 
the tests by requiring the men to perform one series of 
tests without smoking and the other two series after 
smoking. A comparison was made between the amount 
of work accomplished and the accuracy and relative im- 
provement in the tests, first, without tobacco and, sec- 
ond, with tobacco. Six tests frequently used in 
psychological experiments were employed by Professor 
Johnson in this investigation. Two of the tests, a 
logical memory test and an addition test, were regarded 
as tests of the more complex mental processes. The 
non-smokers made an average improvement from the 
first series to the third of 17.1 per cent, while the 
smokers made an average improvement of 9.1 per cent. THE PROBLEMS IN LABORATORY INVESTIGATION 
169 
The non-smokers gained i per cent over the smokers in 
logical memory and 7.6 per cent in the addition test. 
The smokers, however, gained in accuracy in logical 
memory more than did the non-smokers. In the other 
tests the smokers declined in accuracy as compared with 
the non-smokers. 
Professor Johnson conducted a second experiment in 
which he trained four men in aiming, steadiness of con- 
trol, color naming, tapping, and addition until they had 
reached the limit of their improvement. Then when a 
subject had reached the limit of improvement he would 
smoke a cigar. After smoking he would perform all 
the tests and repeat them at intervals of an hour 
throughout the day. The experiments were conducted 
for several weeks. The performance of each subject 
after smoking was compared with his performance 
before smoking. Johnson’s report shows a slight effect 
of tobacco ranging from an average gain of eight 
tenths of one per cent in addition to a loss of three per 
cent in the naming of colors. The results were so slight 
as to be of little significance, especially when the prob- 
able error in each case was calculated. 
Professor Johnson made an attempt to test mental 
functions separately and control environmental condi- 
tions acting on his subjects, but a very disturbing factor 
could not be controlled. The men who took the tests 
knew when they smoked, and so the element of interest 
or prejudice may have played and doubtless did play 
an important part in determining the efficiency of their 
performance. If a student were prejudiced for or 170 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
against tobacco, his attitude would probably affect his 
performance after he had smoked, no matter how much 
he might exert himself to overcome his prejudice. A 
non-smoker would be influenced by all the circum- 
stances connected with his smoking and not only by 
the direct effect of the tobacco as a drug. If a student 
were addicted to tobacco and so enjoyed it, he would 
probably be beneficially affected by smoking merely as 
a repetition of an habitual act, irrespective of the in- 
fluence of tobacco as a drug upon his intellectual func- 
tions. On the other hand, while he was being deprived 
of tobacco he would suffer some disturbance because 
of his inability to perform an habitual act, with the 
result that there would be a slowing down or erratic 
action in his intellectual functions. It is manifestly 
impossible to measure the direct effect of tobacco as a 
drug upon intellectual function so long as factors of 
interest, prejudice, suggestion, or deprivation, or all of 
them together, are operating. These must be controlled 
before the direct drug effect of tobacco can be detected. 
Professor Johnson’s results, therefore, while suggestive 
are not conclusive, because we do not know whether 
the effects reported are due to the drug effect of to- 
bacco or to associated factors, or to all of them com- 
bined. 
The second laboratory investigation of the effects of 
tobacco upon intellectual processes to be mentioned has 
been reported by Dr. A. D. Bush, Instructor in Physi- 
ology in the University of Vermont (now in the Uni- THE PROBLEMS IN LABORATORY INVESTIGATION 
171 
versity of North Dakota). Dr. Bush took a superior 
student who did not use tobacco and subjected him to 
a series of tests on ten mental functions. He then se- 
lected men who were smokers and subjected them to 
the tests which he had given to the student who did not 
smoke. He assumed that the record made by the latter 
subject was normal, and he checked the records made 
by the ten smokers in comparison with the records made 
by the non-smoker. Using this method, he found that 
the smokers were distinctly inferior to the non-smoker 
in all the mental functions. The functions of percep- 
tion, imagery, and association showed a loss of as high 
as seventeen per cent while the other functions did not 
suffer quite so heavily. 
It is apparent that the method used by Dr. Bush 
might yield erroneous results, because the record made 
by one non-smoking student was accepted as a normal 
record for all non-smokers. If a large number of non- 
smoking students had been tested it is conceivable, and 
indeed probable, that there would be wide variation 
among them. The reliability of the results of the in- 
vestigation was further reduced because a prize student 
was chosen to establish the non-smoking standard or 
norm. If a typical, and especially if an inferior, stu- 
dent had been chosen the record would probably have 
been much lower, and it is possible that the records 
made by the smoking students would have shown a 
gain as compared with the non-smoking norm or stand- 
ard. The reliability of Dr. Bush’s results was still 
further unfavorably affected because apparently no 172 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
effort was made to control suggestion or prejudice. 
The smokers knew when they smoked, and they also 
knew that their mental functions were being tested in 
comparison with a non-smoking student. As already 
pointed out, one cannot depend upon the results of a 
study of the effects of a drug on mental functions 
when interest or prejudice plays a role in determining 
these results. 
The outcome of a third experimental investigation 
has been reported by Professor Berry, of the Univer- 
sity of Michigan. His method consisted of testing 
himself after a period of smoking, and again after a 
period of abstinence. He tested himself on ten alter- 
nate days in adding a group of figures after he had 
smoked a cigar. Then he tested himself on ten 
alternate days on the same amount of addition without 
smoking a cigar. He attempted to keep conditions 
absolutely uniform except for the smoking of a cigar. 
He scored the results of all the tests on the smoking 
and non-smoking days by the amount of time he re- 
quired to perform the tests on each occasion, and the 
number of errors he made. He found that he made an 
average of 10.8 errors in the tests performed under 
the influence of a cigar, while he made an average of 
11.3 errors in the tests performed without the aid of 
a cigar. In regard to the rapidity of the work, he 
found that he could perform the tests on an average 
of a minute and a half more rapidly with the aid of a 
cigar than without it. He concluded from his data THE PROBLEMS IN LABORATORY INVESTIGATION 
173 
that his efficiency was increased about one tenth by 
smoking a cigar. 
It should be noted, however, that he had become 
habituated to smoking a cigar after supper. When he 
deprived himself of his customary smoke, it is appar- 
ent that he would suffer some disturbance, and this 
would undoubtedly affect his intellectual functions un- 
favorably. One might have predicted before the tests 
were made that there would be a loss in both speed 
and accuracy on the nights when the subject denied 
himself his usual cigar. And further, he was, of 
course, aware of the fact that he was indulging him- 
self in his smoke or depriving himself of it, and it is 
highly improbable that he could resist the effect of this 
knowledge upon his mental activities. He could hardly 
have undertaken the investigation without some antici- 
pation of the results, either in favor of his cigar or 
hostile to it. That is to say, the experimenter must 
have been prejudiced in a measure, and he did not use 
technique which would counteract the influence of this 
prejudice. No one can tell from his results whether 
tobacco or prejudice or suggestion or deprivation played 
the chief role in affecting his efficiency in addition. 
A fourth investigation may be noted, though it is 
inconclusive. Dean Charles Hughes Johnston, of the 
University of Illinois, made observations upon himself 
over a period of ten years. He noted the effect upon 
his emotions and his capacity to perform mental work 
during periods of heavy smoking as compared with his 174 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
feelings and efficiency in performing intellectual tasks 
when he was abstaining from tobacco. Unfortunately, 
Dean Johnston was killed by an accident before he com- 
pleted his observations, or at least before he interpreted 
his figures and charts. The writer has studied the data, 
both the figures and the charts, left by Dean Johnston; 
and while they seem to indicate a marked disturbance 
in emotion and intellectual functions during periods of 
heavy smoking as compared with periods of abstinence, 
still the writer hesitates to make this definite and final 
assertion, for the reason that Dean Johnston used cer- 
tain terms to denote changes in the phenomena he was 
observing, the exact content of which terms is not clear. 
The writer has asked associates of Dean Johnston at 
the time the observations were being recorded, for their 
interpretation of certain terms used by him; and as 
there is some difference of opinion as to the precise 
meanings of the terms, the investigation is referred to 
here merely as suggestive but not conclusive of emo- 
tional and intellectual disturbance during periods of 
heavy smoking as compared with periods of abstinence. 
It should be noted before concluding this resume of 
the few laboratory investigations of the influence of 
tobacco on intellectual processes that have been 
reported, that there is lack of agreement in the results. 
Berry’s conclusions, for instance, are directly opposed 
to those reported by Bush and by Johnston. This lack 
of agreement is probably due to the fact that these 
experimenters did not employ a technique of investiga- THE PROBLEMS IN LABORATORY INVESTIGATION 
175 
tion which would enable them to detect the influence of 
tobacco as a drug uncomplicated by iactors of interest, 
suggestion, prejudice, or deprivation. TIabitues of 
tobacco being subjected to tests and believing that to- 
bacco was being put on trial for its life might, in sorat 
cases, make an extraordinary effort to establish a su- 
perior record in the tests, while in other cases they 
might become apprehensive and tense and so would 
fail to achieve as much as they would ordinarily be 
capable of. Again, a subject who is denied a cus- 
tomary smoke at a given hour in order to determine 
whether his mind is as keen and dependable as when he 
smokes could hardly resist the depressing influence of 
deprivation. Once more, a non-smoking subject who 
is aware that he is smoking will be likely to suffer intel- 
lectual retardation, especially if he has prejudices 
against tobacco or believes that it will cause physiolog- 
ical disturbance; and his performance will be affected 
unfavorably by suggestion without reference to the 
direct effect of tobacco as a drug. It is necessary to 
test his efficiency when he thinks he is smoking, but 
when he is actually not smoking, in order to keep the 
factor of suggestion uniform. 
The failure to eliminate interest, suggestion, depriva- 
tion, and suggestion vitiates the laboratory results re- 
ported by previous investigators. The investigators 
undoubtedly appreciated the fact that they were not 
measuring the effects of tobacco alone when their sub- 
jects knew that they were smoking or were not smok- 
ing, but they did not see how these disturbing factors 176 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
could be controlled. Rivers, who had successfully 
eliminated the factor of suggestion from the study of 
the effects of certain drugs, declared that it would be 
impossible to control the factor of interest or prejudice 
in regard to tobacco. He did not see any way to dis- 
guise the fact to a subject that he was or was not 
smoking, and so he concluded that it would not be 
possible to investigate the effects of tobacco as a drug 
uncomplicated by other factors. 
The long history of the investigation of the effects 
of alcohol and caffeine on mental functions has 
abundantly proven that a subject cannot repress inter- 
est in regard to the outcome of a test; he is either for 
or against alcohol or caffeine. He thinks that he will 
be affected one way or another by these drugs, even 
though he tries to be impartial or neutral, and so he 
will be affected, whether or not the drugs as such exert 
any influence. A subject under experiment cannot 
purge his mind of all beliefs or attitudes if he knows 
what is going on during the investigation, even if he 
deliberately attempts to maintain a neutral attitude. 
The investigators of alcohol and caffeine could not 
depend upon their findings until they had successfully 
devised a technique which would enable them to dis- 
guise the drug which they were administering and 
studying. CHAPTER X 
THE CONTROL OF DISTURBING FACTORS IN THE 
INVESTIGATION OF TOBACCO 
In the present investigation a successful effort was 
made by Dr. Clark L. Hull, who had charge of the 
laboratory work, to develop a technique and to observe 
a method of procedure which would control certain 
factors, mentioned in the preceding chapter, which 
have lessened the value of the results of previous 
laboratory studies of the effect of tobacco upon mental 
efficiency. Of course, it was necessary at the outset to 
devise tests, or to select tests already devised, of some 
or all of the mental functions involved in the efficient 
solution of the problems of daily life, and these tests 
will be described in a later chapter. It was necessary, 
in the second place, to apply these tests to a sufficiently 
large number of smokers and of non-smokers so as to 
control the factor of variation among individuals, and 
to require each subject to perform the tests a sufficient 
number of times, both with and without the influence 
of tobacco, so as to control the factor of variation in 
the same subject from hour to hour and day to day. 
After preliminary experimentation, it was determined 
that a subject would have to be tested about three hours 
a day for eighteen consecutive days. Each subject was 
177 178 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
told that he would be tested for twenty days, because it 
was found that when he knew he was being tested for 
the last time it would affect his performance. There 
was no apparent let-down in the performance of any 
subject during the eighteen days, at the end of which 
time he was informed that the tests were completed, 
though he anticipated the tests would be continued for 
two more days. 
It was found by preliminary trial that it would be 
desirable to use a “team” of tests which would require 
about a half an hour to execute. Every day each sub- 
ject performed the tests, first without smoking, and 
then three times after smoking, the total time required 
to complete them being three hours. The purpose in 
repeating the tests three times after smoking was to 
determine whether the later effects of tobacco were 
different from the immediate effects. An interval of 
about five minutes for relaxation was allowed before 
repeating the “team” of tests, and a little interval was 
allowed between the tests themselves, so that the mo- 
mentum gained from one test would not be carried 
over to the next one. 
The test period was from six forty-five to about 
nine forty-five in the evening. The psychological 
laboratory was quiet at that hour, and there were no 
distractions of any sort. The subjects were asked to 
carry out their regular program during the day—to 
smoke as they had been accustomed to do or to abstain 
if they were non-smokers. Among the smokers, those 
who habitually smoked pipes were chosen over cigar A partial view of the psychological laboratory in which a study of the effects of 
tobacco on motor and intellectual processes was conducted. CONTROL OF DISTURBING FACTORS 
179 
or cigarette smokers, because it was found that it would 
be easier to run a control on pipe smoking than on 
cigarette or cigar smoking. The subjects were all men 
students in the University of Wisconsin. 
It has already been pointed out that those who had 
previously attempted to conduct laboratory investiga- 
tion of the effect of tobacco on the intellectual proc- 
esses had failed to control the factor of interest or 
prejudice. In the present investigation, it was deter- 
mined to control these vitiating factors or else the 
results would be of slight value; so Dr. Hull addressed 
himself to the task of developing a control which would 
make it possible to measure the influence of tobacco as a 
drug uncomplicated by the factors which have been 
mentioned. It will be apparent to any one that the 
effect felt by a subject in smoking is made up of a 
variety of sensations. These include the sensations 
arising from the sight of the pipe and the smoke, the 
odor of the smoke and its taste, the temperature sen- 
sations derived from the warm smoke, and tactile, 
muscular, and auditory sensations derived from the 
suction of the air through the bowl and stem of the 
pipe. As a control on suggestion through the visual 
factors, the subject was blindfolded. He was told that 
the purpose of the blindfold was to eliminate the visual 
factors, and to test the saying.that blind men rarely 
enjoy smoking. The device worked out by Dr. Hull 
to afford the subject all the sensations of smoking but 
without the use of tobacco consisted of a common pipe, 180 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
containing an electric heating apparatus in the form of 
a coil. This was surrounded by asbestos and placed 
in an aluminum cylinder, which, in turn, was fixed in 
the bowl of the pipe. 
Thus the sensations which the subject derived from 
the contact of his lips with the stem were the same as 
those derived from the use of a real pipe. The heating 
was easily controlled by an electric arrangement, so that 
the temperature of the air, as it was drawn through the 
control pipe, was about the same as that of ordinary 
smoke. The taste of the air drawn through the control 
pipe was interpreted by the subject, as a rule, to be the 
same as the taste of tobacco. A mild tobacco that does 
not “bite” to any extent was used in this investigation, 
and the heat sensation was the principal factor in the 
gustatory experience. The part played by taste in the 
enjoyment of smoking is very slight; smell plays the 
chief role. We can taste only sweet, sour, bitter, and 
saline substances, so that the peculiar “taste” of tobacco 
must be due to smell. 
Suggestion was employed to place the subject in an 
acceptable and uncritical state of mind toward the 
pseudo-smoke so that he would believe he was actually 
smoking. The subject never saw the control pipe. 
The pipe which he smoked every “smoke day” lay on 
the table before him, amidst a pile of ashes, matches, 
spilled tobacco, and the open can of tobacco. All these 
familiar sights tended to dispose him toward actual 
smoking and to allay any doubts that he might have. Pipes used in the study of the effect of tobacco on motor and 
intellectual processes. The pipe above is the control pipe, devised by 
Dr. Hull to control factors of interest, prejudice, and suggestion. CONTROL OF DISTURBING FACTORS 
181 
The procedure was begun every night in about the 
same manner. When the blindfold was fastened and 
the subject was getting ready for his pseudo-smoke, 
he heard the tapping and scraping of the pipe by the 
experimenter, the opening of the tobacco can, and the 
filling of the real pipe, during which time the control 
pipe was being put in readiness. Finally, the experi- 
menter lighted a match, which the subject heard, and 
then lighted the pipe and took a few puffs to start it, 
and he smoked the real pipe while the subject smoked 
the control pipe, so that the subject smelled the tobacco 
which he thought he was smoking, but which was 
smoked by the experimenter. In consequence of this 
process of suggestion, the subject was put into a wholly 
uncritical attitude toward the control smoking; he 
believed he was smoking whenever the control was run 
on him. 
Every subject gave testimony at the end of each test 
period regarding his experience in taking the tests, and 
especially his sensations while he was smoking. These 
testimonies show that the subjects believed they were 
smoking when the control was being used on them. 
After each subject had completed the entire series of 
tests he was informed that during a part of the time 
when he thought he was smoking he was only drawing 
in heated air through the control pipe; and every sub- 
ject was much surprised. These testimonies showed 
that the control fulfilled its purpose completely and that 
the factors of interest, prejudice, and suggestion were 182 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
prevented from playing a disturbing role in measuring 
the effect of tobacco as a drug upon intellectual func- 
tions. 
The condensed testimony of one subject may be 
given here as typical, in main features, though not in 
details, of the testimony of others. The subject was 
tested by Mr. Matravers, who served first as subject 
and later as experimenter, and who testified that in his 
own case when he served as a subject he believed he 
was smoking every evening and never suspected that 
a control was being run on him. The testimony of 
the subject whom he tested may be summarized as fol- 
lows: 
Subject, A. M. G.: 
The only evidence that he could distinguish between 
control smoking and actual smoking was found in his 
statement that sometimes there seemed to be a gradual 
increase in the strength of the smoke revealed by the 
“bite” on his tongue. “S” (“S” means subject) some- 
times seemed to detect a difference between control 
smoking and actual smoking by the scent of the tobacco, 
but usually did not smell tobacco smoke. There were 
several times when he could not tell whether the pipe 
was going or not. Such periods lasted for three or 
four puffs. “S” was always sure that he was smoking 
most of the time every evening. There was never any 
evening when he could have been persuaded that he had 
not been smoking at least ninety-five per cent of the 
time. 
“S” thought that on some nights there was little or Dr. Hull is here shown administering the control smoke. The 
subject always believed he was actually smoking. CONTROL OF DISTURBING FACTORS 
183 
no “biting” of the tongue. On such nights he said he 
could tell he was smoking by the flavor of the smoke. 
The last night he said it was so strong he did not like 
it. It “bit” his tongue, and it was an effort for him to 
take another “pull.” The preceding night it was fairly 
good; it did not “bite” his tongue to any great extent. 
It would be an easy matter for him to break off smoking 
if it was always like the last night. He enjoyed it on 
the next to the last night; it was not strong at all, it 
tasted fairly well, and took the place of not being able 
to inhale. “S” thinks it would be pretty hard to quit 
under such conditions. 
“S” said that the smoking in the laboratory gave him 
satisfaction so that he would not crave for more smok- 
ing for some time. He missed the strength at the be- 
ginning of the smoke because he could not inhale, but 
down near the bottom it was really too strong even 
without inhaling. He never felt any dizziness or other 
bad effects. 
The reader should bear in mind that the function of 
the control was to keep all the factors in the experiment 
uniform except the one factor of the drug effect of 
tobacco. On certain days the subject would smoke 
actual tobacco, on other days he would smoke the con- 
trol pipe; but he would believe that he was always 
smoking tobacco, so that if he were prejudiced in favor 
of tobacco or against it he would have no different 
attitude on the days when he was smoking from what 
he would have on the days when he was not smoking. 184 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
It was said above that each subject was tested three 
hours a day for eighteen consecutive days. The days 
when he smoked actual tobacco and when he smoked 
the control pipe are indicated in the following table: 
1st day—tobacco smoke 
2d day—tobacco smoke 
3d day—control smoke 
4th day—tobacco smoke 
5th day—control smoke 
6th day—control smoke 
7th day—tobacco smoke 
8th day—control smoke 
9th day—tobacco smoke 
10th day—tobacco smoke 
nth day—control smoke 
12th day—control smoke 
13th day—tobacco smoke 
14th day—control smoke 
15th day—tobacco smoke 
16th day—tobacco smoke 
17th day—control smoke 
18th day—tobacco smoke 
The reason for the irregular order in which the sub- 
ject smoked real tobacco and when he smoked the 
control was to obviate any possibility of the establish- 
ment of a rhythm in smoking as contrasted with non- 
smoking. CHAPTER XI 
THE EFFECT OF TOBACCO ON CERTAIN PHYSIOLOG- 
ICAL AND MOTOR PROCESSES 
As explained in a previous chapter, this investiga- 
tion has to do with the effect of tobacco on the intel- 
lectual processes; but it was deemed advisable to make 
note of its effect upon the pulse and upon motor steadi- 
ness, control, and endurance, in order, first, to deter- 
mine whether the influence of tobacco, if there is any, 
upon the action of the heart and of muscular activities 
is more or is less marked than its effect upon the intel- 
lectual processes. In the second place, the rapidity of 
heart beat undoubtedly has at least an indirect influence 
upon mental functions. Physicians have said to the 
writer in response to inquiry that they have observed 
cases in which a smoker’s pulse beat fell below normal, 
and the subject became lethargic in body and mind. On 
the other hand, when the pulse beat goes much above 
normal, there is likely to be undue bodily agitation and 
mental confusion. It was stated by all the physicians 
who responded to the writer’s inquiry that heart action 
varying not more than five or ten points above or below 
normal was necessary for proper activity of body or 
mind. 
185 186 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
The connection between rapidity and steadiness of 
and endurance in motor activity on the one side and 
intellectual activity on the other is undoubtedly more 
intimate than the connection between pulse beat and 
mental function. It is, of course, not possible to say 
that an agent affecting motor steadiness and control 
will affect intellectual processes in the same manner 
and degree, but we are warranted, in view of extensive 
investigations in this field, in saying that any influence 
producing increase or decrease in steadiness, rapidity, 
and endurance of action must operate through the cen- 
tral nervous system, and so the effect must be in some 
measure general. At any rate, it was deemed advisable 
to make a record of the motor effects of tobacco, if 
any, in order to note whether they were more or were 
less easily affected than the intellectual processes. 
The technique of investigating rate of pulse and 
motor steadiness, rapidity, and endurance will not be 
described in detail here. As stated in another place, 
Dr. Hull is publishing a separate and detailed account 
of the laboratory investigation, and this will contain a 
full description of the methods and apparatus employed 
in each of the laboratory tests. It will be enough to 
say here that a record was made of the rate of pulse 
of the subject seven times during each day’s test period 
—immediately upon entering the laboratory, fifteen 
minutes afterward, before each “team” of tests, after 
smoking, and after the last team of tests was completed. 
Each subject was in the laboratory for about a quarter 
of an hour before the tests were begun, so that he EFFECT OF TOBACCO ON CERTAIN PROCESSES 
187 
might recover from the physical exertion required to 
come to the laboratory. The records of rate of pulse 
of two subjects, one an habitual smoker and the other 
a non-smoker, are presented in Tables A and B. Sim- 
ilar tables were made for twelve subjects who took the 
tests. The two tables are presented merely as samples. 
Certain general explanations will be in place here in 
order to make the tables intelligible. In all of them 
there are two series of data, one series labeled “Control 
days,” and one “Tobacco days.” The data presented 
under “Control days” are the scores made by the sub- 
ject on the days when he smoked the control pipe, which 
is explained in Chapter X, and so was not under the 
influence of tobacco. He thought he was smoking, so 
that he was in no different mental attitude toward his 
performance from what he was on “Tobacco days.” 
The data presented under “Tobacco days” are the scores 
which the subject made under the influence of tobacco. 
It should be noted that there was no regular alterna- 
tion between control and tobacco days, for the reason 
given in Chapter X. 
The first column of figures in Tables A and B was 
secured by averaging the first three readings of the 
pulse—the first taken immediately after the subject 
entered the laboratory; the second fifteen minutes later, 
and the third just before smoking. This average is 
presented as the “normal” for each day, whether control 
or tobacco day, that the subject took the tests. The 
second, third, fourth, and fifth columns show the rate  
Original Scores 
Difference between the Normal Rate for the Day 
Indicated and Subsequent Tests for that Day 
Average 
Difference 
Test I 
(Normal) 
Test 
II 
Test 
III 
Test 
IV 
Test 
V 
Test II 
Test III 
Test IV 
Test V 
Control days: 
April 27 . . . 
“ 29 . . . 
90.6 
76 
77 
72 
62 
— 14.6 
- 13-6 
- 18.6 
- 28.6 
- 18.85 
95-6 
78 
73 
70 
71 
— 17.6 
— 22.6 
- 25.6 
— 24.6 
— 22.6 
“ 30 . . • 
98.3 
80 
72 
71 
68 
- 18.3 
- 26.3 
- 27.3 
- 30-3 
~ 25.55 
May 2 . . . 
“ 5 • • • 
101.0 
86 
82 
83 
81 
- 15-0 
— 19.0 
— 18.0 
— 20.0 
— 18.0 
95-0 
85 
72 
73 
74 
— 10.0 
- 23.0 
— 22.0 
— 21.0 
— I9.O 
“ 6 . . . 
86.3 
77 
7i 
76 
70 
- 9-3 
- 15-3 
— IO.3 
- 16.3 
— 12.8 
“ 8 . . . 
97.0 
87 
73 
76 
67 
— 10.0 
— 24.0 
— 21.0 
- 3«-o 
- 21.25 
“ II . . . 
90.3 
76 
68 
64 
68 
- 14-3 
- 22.3 
- 26.3 
- 22.3 
- 21.3 
Total 
754-1 
645 
588 
585 
561 
— 109.1 
— 166.1 
— I69.I 
- I93-I 
- 159-35 
Average . . . . 
94.26 
80.6 
73-5 
73-i 
70.1 
- 13.63 
— 20.8 
— 21.1 
— 24.1 
- 19-9 
M. V 
2.9 
3-6 
4-i 
4.2 
2-75 
P. Em 
.86 
1.07 
1.24 
1.26 
.82 
Effect of Tobacco on Rate of Pulse Beat 
Subject No. 12, habitual smoker. Score: number of beats in one minute 
TABLE A 
188  
Original Scores 
Difference between the Normal Rate for the Day 
Indicated and Subsequent Tests for that Day 
Average 
Difference 
Test I 
(Normal) 
Test 
II 
Test 
III 
Test 
IV 
Test 
V 
Test II 
Test III 
Test IV 
Test V 
Tobacco days: 
Apr. 26 . . . 
“ 28 . . . 
95-3 
80 
75 
70 
71 
- 15-3 
- 20.3 
- 25.3 
- 24.3 
- 21.3 
98.0 
90 
73 
72 
70 
- 8.0 
- 25.O 
— 26.0 
— 28.0 
- 21.75 
May 1 . . . 
105.0 
90 
89 
80 
79 
- 150 
— 16.O 
- 25.0 
— 26.0 
- 20.5 
“ 3 • • • 
81.3 
8l 
75 
74 
69 
•3 
- 6.3 
- 7-3 
- 12-3 
~ 6.55 
“ 4 • • • 
84.0 
84 
69 
60 
60 
0 
- 15-0 
— 24.0 
— 24.O 
- 15-75 
“ 7 • • • 
88.0 
85 
78 
77 
69 
- 3-0 
— 10.0 
— 11.0 
— 19.O 
- 10.75 
“ 9 • • • 
95-0 
87 
77 
70 
74 
— 8.0 
— 18.0 
- 25.0 
— 21.0 
— 18.0 
“ 10 . . . 
95-6 
87 
70 
74 
67 
- 8.6 
- 25.6 
— 21.6 
- 28.6 
— 21.1 
“ 12 . . . 
89.0 
83 
73 
70 
64 
- 6.0 
— l6.0 
— 19.0 
- 25.O 
- 16.5 
Total .... 
831.2 
767 
679 
647 
623 
— 64.2 
- 152.2 
— 184.2 
— 208.2 
- 152.2 
Average .... 
92.3 
85.2 
75-4 
72 
69.2 
- 7.13 
— 16.9 
- 20.5 
- 23.1 
— 16.9 
M. V 
4-3 
4-7 
5-34 
3-8 
4.02 
P. Em 
1.21 
1-33 
1.50 
1.07 
1.20 
Effect of 
Tobacco: 
Difference . . . 
+ 6.5 
+ 3-9 
+ .6 
+ 1.0 
+ 3-o 
P. Ed 
1.48 
1.707 
1.94 
1.65 
1-45 
Ratio 
4-39 
2.28 
•3i 
•6l 
2.08 
Reliability . . . 
•9985 
•9379 
.5828 
.6596 
.9196 
% Gain or loss . 
+ 6.9 
+ 4.1 
+ *64 
+ 1.07 
+ 3-2 
TABLE A—Continued 
189  
Original Scores 
Difference between the Normal Rate for the Day 
Indicated and Subsequent Tests for that Day 
Average 
Difference 
Test I 
(Normal) 
Test 
II 
Test 
III 
Test 
IV 
Test 
V 
Test II 
Test III 
Test IV 
Test V 
Control Days: 
March 17 . . 
72 
70 
72 
70 
68 
— 2 
O 
— 2 
- 4 
— 2.0 
“ 19 • • 
87 
82 
78 
70 
76 
- 5 
- 9 
- 17 
— II 
- 10-5 
“ 20 . . 
83 
84 
78 
72 
74 
+ 1 
- 5 
— 11 
- 9 
— 6.0 
“ 22 . . 
77 
76 
78 
74 
72 
— 1 
+ 1 
- 3 
- 5 
— 2.0 
“ 25 . . 
88 
84 
84 
82 
78 
- 4 
- 4 
- 6 
— 10 
— 6.0 
“ 26 . . 
85 
80 
78 
82 
80 
- 5 
- 7 
- 3 
- 5 
- 5.o 
“ 28 . . 
77 
80 
76 
74 
70 
+ 3 
— 1 
- 3 
- 7 
— 2.0 
“ 31 • • 
80 
82 
76 
72 
78 
+ 2 
- 4 
- 8 
— 2 
- 3-0 
Total 
649 
638 
620 
596 
596 
— 11 
-29 
“53 
-53 
-36.5 
Average .... 
81.1 
79-7 
77-5 
74-5 
74-5 
- i-37 
- 3-6 
- 6.6 
- 6.6 
- 4-5 
M. V 
2.62 
2.72 
4.02 
2.62 
2.31 
P. Em 
•783 
.813 
1.20 
•783 
.69 
Effect of Tobacco on Rate of Pulse Beat 
Subject No. 7, non-smoker. Score: number of beats in one minute 
TABLE B 
190  
Original Scores 
Difference between the Normal Rate for the Day 
Indicated and Subsequent Tests for that Day 
Average 
Difference 
Test I 
(Normal) 
Test 
II 
Test 
III 
Test 
IV 
Test 
V 
Test II 
Test III 
Test IV 
Test V 
Tobacco Days: 
March 16 . . 
73 
82 
72 
70 
70 
+ 9 
— 
1 
- 3 
- 3 
4- -5 
“ x8 . . 
80 
86 
70 
74 
74 
+ 6 
— 
10 
- 6 
- 6 
- 4.0 
“ 21 . . 
75 
78 
76 
76 
70 
+ 3 
+ 
1 
+ 1 
+ 1 
4- 1.5 
“ 23 . . 
80 
84 
74 
80 
76 
+ 4 
— 
6 
0 
- 4 
- 1.5 
“ 24 . . 
79 
76 
74 
74 
72 
- 3 
— 
5 
- 5 
- 7 
- 5-o 
“ 27 . . 
80 
88 
80 
84 
86 
+ 8 
0 
+ 4 
+ 6 
4- 4-5 
“ 29 . . 
83 
82 
80 
78 
74 
— 1 
— 
3 
- 5 
- 9 
- 4-5 
“ 30 • • 
84 
84 
78 
76 
72 
0 
— 
6 
- 8 
— 12 
- 6.5 
April 1 . . 
72 
72 
74 
70 
70 
0 
+ 
2 
— 2 
— 2 
- -5 
Total 
706 
732 
678 
682 
670 
4- 26 
- 
28 
-24 
- 36 
- 15-5 
Average .... 
78.4 
81.3 
75-3 
75-8 
74-4 
+ 2.9 
— 
3-i 
— 2.6 
- 4.0 
- 1.7 
M. V 
3-45 
3-23 
3-04 
4.0 
2.91 
P. Em 
•973 
.910 
•857 
1.12 
.819 
Effect of 
Tobacco: 
■f 2.8 
Difference . . . 
+ 4-27 
4- 
•5 
+ 4-o 
4- 2.6 
P. En 
1.248 
1.22 
1-474 
1.36 
1.07 
Ratio 
3-42 
.409 
2.71 
1.91 
2.61 
Reliability . . . 
•989 
.608 
.966 
.901 
.960 
% Gain or loss . 
+ 5-35 
4- 
.6 
*+ 5-o 
4- 3-2 
+ 3-5 
TABLE B — Continued 
191 192 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
of pulse beat at each reading during each experiment 
period. The sixth, seventh, eighth, and ninth columns 
show the relation between the rate of the pulse at each 
reading and the “normal” for the day. The last col- 
umn shows the average difference between the rate of 
pulse during the experiment period and the “normal” 
rate for the day. 
It will be noted that there is in the case of both sub- 
jects a general decline in rate of pulse beat at each 
reading during each day’s experimental period, except 
in the case of Subject No. 7 (Table B), whose pulse 
rate while under the influence of tobacco increased at 
the first reading after the “normal.” The high rate 
at the first three readings, averaged to make the 
“normal,” was undoubtedly due to the effect upon the 
subject of walking up a long hill to the laboratory, to 
his having recently finished his evening meal, and to the 
excitement of getting ready for the tests. For our pur- 
pose it is immaterial what the “normal” rate was; the 
only thing of significance is the action of the pulse dur- 
ing each evening’s experiment on the control as com- 
pared with the tobacco days. Gain in rate of pulse is 
denoted by the + sign and decline by the — sign. It 
can be seen by glancing at the figures in columns 6, 7, 8, 
and 9, Table A, that in the case of Subject No. 12 there 
was a decline in rate of pulse as compared with the 
“normal” rate for each day on both control and to- 
bacco days at all readings. In the case of Subject No. 
7, a non-smoker (Table B), the rate of pulse on March 
20, 28, and 31, control days, increased 1, 3, and 2 EFFECT OF TOBACCO ON CERTAIN PROCESSES 
193 
beats respectively at the first reading after the normal. 
On March 16, 18, 21, and 27, tobacco days, the rate of 
pulse of this subject increased 9, 6, 3, 4, and 8 beats 
respectively at the first reading after the normal. 
The average rate of pulse at each reading for both 
subjects is shown for all the control and all the tobacco 
days. It will be noted that in the case of both subjects 
the average for the tobacco days at every reading after 
the normal, except in one instance, is higher than on 
the control days. In the case of Subject No. 7 (Table 
B) the average on the tobacco days is higher at the 
first three readings and .1 of a beat lower at the last 
reading than on the control days. The average de- 
crease in rate of pulse beat is less on tobacco days than 
on control days, as shown in the tenth column in both 
tables, which means that the tobacco was exerting some 
influence to keep up rapidity of heart action, though this 
influence is not marked. 
In the tables the symbols M.V., P.E.m., and P.E.d. 
are used. These refer to methods of computing the 
reliability of the results of the tests. In all data of this 
character there is possibility of error. Certainty of 
results depends upon the number of cases and the 
variability among the cases. Investigators always 
make use of methods of determining the probable error 
in their results, and in this way they can say that their 
conclusions are accurate within certain limits. 
In Table A, the difference between the average of 
the decrease in rate of pulse of Subject No. 12 on 194 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
tobacco days as compared with control days for all 
readings, shown in column io, is 3 beats. The prob- 
ability that this is an accurate difference between the 
rate of pulse on tobacco days as compared with control 
days is about nineteen times greater than that it is a 
chance difference. In other words, we may accept the 
result as accurate, much more accurate than most of the 
conclusions which people believe and upon which they 
act in daily life in respect to phenomena of this 
nature. 
But is the result significant, even though accurate? 
In order to answer this question, it is necessary to see 
what the difference between rate of pulse on control and 
on tobacco days means in relation to the normal rate of 
pulse, which is found by taking the average of the 
averages of the normal rate for all the days of the ex- 
perimental period, and then calculating what percentage 
the difference is of the normal rate. The normal rate 
is found by adding the average normal for control days 
to the average normal for the tobacco days and dividing 
by 2. This was found to be 3.2 per cent in the case of 
Subject No. 12, shown at the bottom of column 10. 
Subject No. 7 was affected to substantially the same 
degree as Subject No. 12. This is not a marked but 
it is a real effect. It is manifest throughout most of 
the tests, though there is some variability, shown by 
the fact there are both + and — quantities in the col- 
umns of differences. Even so, there can be no doubt 
that in the case of these two subjects tobacco tends to 
increase the heart beat between two and six beats a EFFECT OF TOBACCO ON CERTAIN PROCESSES 
195 
minute, though not every time a cigar or pipe is 
smoked. 
Tables like A and B were made for twelve subjects— 
the reading of the pulse was not begun with the first 
subjects who were investigated. average differ- 
ence between the rate of pulse on tobacco days as com- 
pared with control days at all readings for all the sub- 
jects is as follows (Table C) : 
TABLE C 
The per cent of loss or gain, calculated according to the method 
described on p. 194, for each test period on all the tobacco and all the 
control days taken together is presented in this table. The + sign 
denotes that after smoking the heart beat was accelerated by the 
percentage shown, while the — sign denotes that the pulse beat was 
retarded. Comparison is made with the average normal rate for 
control and tobacco days. Subjects who were non-smokers are de- 
noted by the * sign. The first six subjects studied were not tested 
with respect to rate of pulse beat. 
Net Effect of Tobacco on Rate of Pulse Beat 
Subject 
No. 
Test I' 
Test II 
Test III 
Test IV 
Average 
7* 
+ 
5-35 
+ 
.60 
+ 
5.00 
+ 
3.20 
+ 
3-50 
8* 
+ 
11.04 
+ 
4.80 
+ 
2.60 
+ 
1.97 
+ 
512 
9* 
+ 
22.88 
+ 
4.20 
+ 
.16 
+ 
•54 
+ 
6-95 
IO 
+ 
1.20 
+ 
.00 
— 
2.40 
1 
— 
•30 
ii 
+ 
4.90 
+ 
3.00 
+ 
.96 
+ 
7.20 
+ 
4.00 
12 
+ 
6.90 
+ 
4.10 
+ 
.64 
+ 
1.07 
+ 
3.20 
13 
+ 
6-53 
+ 
7.26 
+ 
4.84 
+ 
3-99 
+ 
5-66 
14 
+ 
•35 
+ 12.90 
+ 
8.91 
+ 
9-95 
+ 
8.03 
15 
+ 
16.82 
+ 
12.95 
+ 
11.52 
+ 
8.56 
+ 1307 
l6 
+ 14-97 
+ 
12.81 
+ 
8.56 
+ 
3.62 
+ 
9.98 
17 
+ 
5-09 
+ 
4.22 
+ 
4-37 
+ 
3-31 
+ 
4-25 
18 
+ 18.37 
+ 
8.17 
+ 
3.12 
+ 
9.26 
+ 
9-73 
Averages 
+ 
9-53 
+ 
6.25 
+ 
4.02 
+ 
4-39 
+ 
6.099 
1 The pulse of this subject was not taken at the conclusion of the day’s testing as 
with the other subjects. 196 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
Turning now to steadiness of motor control, or 
tremor, it may be said that this is measured by deter- 
mining the number of tremors made within a given 
period, in this case one minute. The apparatus used 
is indicated in the accompanying photograph. It is con- 
nected with four dry cell batteries and an electric 
counter. The stylus is grasped by the subject, and 
placed in one of the holes, in this case hole 4. (See 
illustration 4.) If he has perfect steadiness the stylus 
while in the hole will be kept free from contacts. 
Whenever a contact is made it is counted on the electric 
counter. The number of contacts made in one minute 
indicates the amount of tremor. The “normal” test 
was made before the subject smoked and the other tests 
after smoking. 
Tables similar to A and B were made for all the 
subjects tested, a total of sixteen. The net effect of 
tobacco on the steadiness of all these subjects is shown 
in Table D. It is apparent that there is loss in all but 
two cases, and the average loss is serious enough to 
merit special attention. 
It will be noted that Subject No. 7, for instance, 
though much steadier than Subject No. 12 in all tests, 
lost more heavily under the influence of tobacco than 
did No. 12. The former lost 40.6 per cent in steadiness 
and the latter 4.2 per cent, shown in the “Average” col- 
umn in Table D. In this table, the -j- sign shows that 
the subject gained in steadiness to the amount indi- 
cated, by reducing the number of tremors made in one 
minute as compared with the normal rate for the day, Apparatus used in the study of the effect of tobacco on steadiness of motor con- 
trol, or tremor, and also the rapidity of tanping. EFFECT OF TOBACCO ON CERTAIN PROCESSES 
197 
TABLE D 
Net Effect of Tobacco on Steadiness of Muscular Control 
The per cent of loss or gain, calculated according to the method 
described on page 194, for each test period on all the tobacco and 
all the control days taken together is presented in this table. The 
+ sign means a gain in efficiency as a result of smoking, while the 
— sign means a loss. Subjects who were non-smokers are denoted 
by the * sign. 
Subject 
No. 
Test I 
Test II 
Test III 
Average 
3* 
— 
21.70 
— 
28.40 
— 
26.40 
— 
2540 
4* 
+ 
1.60 
— 
23-50 
— 
12.10 
— 
11.30 
5* 
— 
3.26 
— 
24.26 
— 
19.10 
— 
15.40 
6* 
— 
85.20 
— 
21.50 
— 
22.70 
— 
43.10 
7* 
— 
48.10 
— 
33-io 
— 
40.70 
— 
40.60 
8* 
— 
25.70 
— 
20.80 
— 
14.80 
— 
20.50 
9* 
— 
108.60 
— 
88.58 
— 
39.00 
— 
78.60 
IO 
— 
72.40 
— 
73.80 
— 
41.90 
— 
6390 
ii 
— 
22.50 
— 
36.60 
— 
5.20 
— 
21.40 
12 
— 
19.40 
— 
-58 
+ 
7.29 
— 
4.27 
13 
— 
7-45 
+ 
9.48 
+ 
26.80 
+ 
9-59 
14 
— 
182.29 
— 
113.70 
— 
10.38 
— 
102.12 
15 
— 
166.04 
— 
123.81 
— 
88.74 
— 
12975 
l6 
— 
37-42 
+ 
7-75 
— 
4.84 
— 
11.48 
17 
+ 
10.78 
+ 
14-79 
+ 
22.69 
+ 
16.16 
18 
— 
46.81 
— 
22.62 
— 
25-93 
— 
31-79 
Averages 
- 
52.22 
- 
36.19 
- 
18.44 
- 
42.12 
while the — sign shows that he lost to the amount in- 
dicated because the number of tremors increased. 
A further study of the effect of tobacco upon motor 
processes was made by requiring the subject to make 
400 taps on a telegraph key, which is shown in the 
photograph. The net results are presented in Table 
E. The data in this table are to be interpreted in 198 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
TABLE E 
The per cent of loss or gain, calculated according to the method 
described on page 194, for each test period on all the tobacco and all 
the control days taken together is presented in this table. Plus 
means a gain in efficiency as a result of smoking, minus means a loss. 
Subjects who were non-smokers are denoted by the * sign. 
Net Effect of Tobacco on Rate of Tapping 
Subject 
No. 
TesJ 1 
Test II 
Test III 
Average 
i* 
+ 5-20 
+ .90 
+ 3-50 
+ 3-20 
2* 
+ 4-40 
- 7.70 
- 4.70 
— 2.60 
3* 
+ 1.15 
- 3-90 
— 2.46 
- 1 74 
4 
+ -76 
+ i-35 
+ 76 
+ -95 
5* 
- 70 
— 2.20 
— 1.90 
— 1.60 
6* 
+ .68 
— 2.01 
+ .26 
- -35 
7* 
- 1.50 
+ -17 
- 1.18 
— .80 
8* 
— 2.62 
+ .30 
- -56 
- .96 
9* 
+ 6.41 
+ 2.04 
+ 2.45 
+ 3-63 
10 
- 5-62 
— 6.12 
+ 4-90 
- 2.30 
II 
— 2.70 
— 1.70 
— 2.90 
— 2.40 
12 
- 3-14 
- 3-72 
- -52 
- 2.47 
13 
- 7-47 
+ 173 
+ .30 
- 1.78 
14 
- 1-95 
- 2.51 
- .13 
- i-53 
15 
+ .92 
+ 2.30 
+1.38 
+ 1.84 
l6 
+ .76 
- 74 
— 1.22 
- .40 
17 
+ 1.83 
— .02 
- i-43 
+ -12 
l8 
+ 2.94 
+ 176 
+ 4-o8 
+ 2.93 
Averages 
+ .03 
— 1.12 
+ .04 
~ -35 
the same way as the data in preceding tables. In this 
case the -f- sign shows that the subject required an 
extra number of seconds as compared with the normal 
for the day to execute 400 taps, while the — sign shows 
that he performed the task in fewer seconds than the 
normal. The net effect of tobacco on this subject’s 
ability to tap on a telegraphic key throughout the entire 
experimental period may be stated as a loss of 2.47 per EFFECT OF TOBACCO ON CERTAIN PROCESSES 
199 
cent of his normal ability, which should be regarded as 
a slight detrimental effect. 
In the case of Subject No. 7 (Table E) a similar 
detrimental effect was produced by tobacco but it was 
so slight—only .8 per cent—as to be entirely negligible. 
TABLE F 
The per cent of loss or gain, calculated according to the method 
described on page 194, for each test period on all the tobacco and all 
the control days taken together, is presented in this table. Plus 
means a gain in efficiency as a result of smoking, minus means a 
loss. Subjects who were non-smokers are denoted by the * sign. 
Net Effect of Tobacco on Muscular Fatigue 
Subject 
No. 
Test I 
Test II 
Test III 
Average 
i* 
.oo 
~ 39-90 
— 48.10 
— 28.40 
3* 
4- io.6o 
+ 24.10 
+ 28.10 
+ 20.30 
4* 
+ 18.60 
+ 13-60 
— 6.00 
4" 8.60 
5* 
+ 2.38 
+ 41.00 
.00 
+ i4-3o 
6* 
+ 10.40 
- 23.10 
— 7.00 
- 6.50 
7* 
+ 25.30 
+ 19-70 
+ 1.60 
+ 15-90 
8* 
+ 3°-6o 
- 13-90 
+ 6.80 
+ 7-8o 
ii 
+ 3-80 
+ 34-20 
+ 90.40 
+ 42-50 
12 
— 16.00 
+ 8.10 
- 30.50 
— 12.90 
13 
+ 42.20 
+ 24.00 
+ 22.30 
4- 29.50 
14 
+ 38-8o 
+ 39-20 
+ 32.70 
+ 37-oo 
15 
+ 13-50 
- 26.73 
- 64.50 
- 27.30 
16 
- 19.27 
- 15.62 
- 43-75 
— 26.04 
17 
+ 7-i8 
- 30.46 
+ 41-05 
+ 5-96 
Averages 
+ 12.00 
+ 3-79 
+ 1.72 
+ 5-76 
In connection with the test on rate of tapping, a 
study was made of the effect of tobacco upon muscular 
fatigue. The reader will bear in mind that in the test 
on tapping the subject was required to tap 400 times, 
and the number of seconds consumed was accurately 200 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
recorded. The time required for the subject to execute 
the first 200 taps and the last 200 was recorded sepa- 
rately by means of a two-stop, fifth-second stop-watch. 
If fatigue did not set in during the tapping test, the 
time required to execute the 400 taps would be exactly 
twice that required for the first 200 taps. The differ- 
ence between the rate for the first and the last 200 taps 
indicates the loss on account of fatigue. The net effect 
of tobacco upon muscular fatigue is shown in Table F. 
The + sign denotes a gain and the — sign a loss in 
performance. CHAPTER XII 
THE EFFECT OF TOBACCO ON INTELLECTUAL PROCESSES 
What is the effect of tobacco on the keenness and 
accuracy of perception in very simple situations? These 
elementary functions were tested by means of the so- 
called “Cancellation test.” Examples of this test are 
shown in the accompanying forms, I, II, and III. One 
Cancellation Test 
Form I 
EDANADYSGMNLDAMUBOIYQJAVACAFOQYAXRUAWZA 
XWXNBMNABDWXJGSAYAETPNXINARAMGAUAAQNMI 
FFAMCXDBAAWABHROAJCWNZAUVAHAAAUAFLTESA 
ALVLNNLXRJAIBAVASTOADXQPAKKVUPEPJVASOYSI 
RAKPQAAAWBKYAAKEOJAEIAARFYRLHNVALHNAPP 
RGAOQHQHCUNPYNMREGTSDPUDVJAEGTAQNJAWMI 
AYYJTADACDFVMOFGOVAFNSTUAIMAJLXIFBKAUCUA 
TSXRAAQAANOWNAWOCIZHQWQLLDBPGMRKUGXBS 
N AC AB WHLEFRKT VFAN N AB ASEPB PAEA JH A WA J N SKL 
UYICTOLAAAXDRDAGWFPAIGXQOCANVWKBTYADHA 
RXUPLGKGVQYHKCASWTAXAHMAKIADAWCSTWZGX 
QNHWUAEIRIOTABHDCGAAINVAFJUREQLBNPJSAEJV 
KYRDFWGFVYAASCNHTACAAEFQWAAHCLUVOABTKH 
Name 
Date 
Test No. 
201 
Score 202 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
Cancellation Test 
Form II 
BACAXBKUAFRLAATDAFZAEJASMOCWAHUVAFWAAZ 
DXCKHMAMGIGATULKARPNVCWAXSGXHTKSAAWQX 
MAADIXAHOGCTVFAYLKAWYUATDPQUBNAGXDRACI 
YVAIUMAJNGKFFAJSATALCVUYUXFDFDTOOCAIMBA 
AKOLOAJASYYESALRNPXIOBPIADKTUJVPSOVVLQLA 
AUPOJBRANJVBIWHLAEAGGEAPTCHAEQCSNIFIJRVN 
UYMUEGANSHRJTATJAPOCAEIHXZGQQZDGDPQRWM 
HNQWKAGB AERCV SOCDCAALH AY AAFHFTY AF V WKU T 
EAAARLKAQAPHNLAKFHNOKAPEIPAJAWRVAABNYY 
SYBQAJOADIXAEAWUNYYQDLARAAOGWCNVJDAUMFA 
AXAOXAGZLRQBNSGAOEWKPWSCUBNRATIDQMHQW 
APTAKNNAEKNBCJAAVWBPREJAZHSAASLEBLHAFMF 
AZRJWAXBJAIUZZDSAMPEWAAXAXBUJQAXMJZTNM 
Name 
.Date 
Test No. 
.Score. 
hundred capital A’s were placed in chance order among 
nine hundred other letters, and the subject endeavored 
to cancel as many A’s without error as possible in one 
minute. His performance was scored first in respect 
to the number of A’s canceled on tobacco as compared 
with control days, and then as to accuracy—omitting 
an A or canceling another letter than A. In order to 
avoid the possibility of the subject learning the posi- 
tion of the A’s in any one form, eight different sets 
were used, so that the subject did not see any one form 
at consecutive tests or on consecutive days, and he be- EFFECT OF TOBACCO ON INTELLECTUAL PROCESSES 
203 
Cancellation Test 
XHOEMKRLDGAATQUWZGGAQABRPSXBOZCZWIASW 
UJKPZEVALLALKSJIVOOQXOTSRSDYAPANVOAPIYLA 
DDAAHOCFZUAM TKAQGWAOVLXTY ARDAGAIXYICPB 
RAADMGPAPZQAQGTOJDUZHMTHXXCWQGJEZRUIES 
AAICGVTPBPUEZHWAIJAAZLQAREBEQVCJHROIZFSJ 
BAAUDLKFFAAAZAGEOJCBXUHAWVAATFACWAMRZA 
ABEBAKWEZSNTAJACHAJRVFPKWALPAZNSLHEAABF 
ARANABLAKIRAKLQEVAAPPENPWAOJAKHYHYFZAA 
OYMRSQAAEWAAOXAADVAYFDLCJBUAEWAGNDQZUYJ 
FKAATCLACWAKHTAVNCYSWBRUAFDYEAOAGFHVQH 
FYAAJFDIVIUCLAGMAMYUKZFAASVDBOTTACAJUOFX 
GGADTXAKMGAQPSXKRZSMACHHWWUTCYVLKIAXA 
XEAGIXBAXMTYMSBGZMAXAZAZRUQZPAWAWIADJZ 
Form III 
Name. 
Date 
Test No. 
lieved he confronted a new form at every test through- 
out the entire eighteen test days. 
The results of this test in respect to number of A’s 
canceled on control and on tobacco days are shown for 
all subjects tested—a total of eleven—in Table G. The 
results of the test in respect to accuracy for all subjects 
are shown in Table H. It may be noted that in the case 
of No. 12 there is a very slight loss from the use of 
tobacco, the percentage for all the tests being 1.8 
(Table G). In respect to errors (Table H) Subject 
No. 12 was apparently more accurate on tobacco than 
Score 204 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
on control days, the percentage of gain being 31. 
However, the errors were so few that the reliability of 
the results is not high. This is true with all subjects, 
and should be borne in mind in interpreting the results 
of the Cancellation Test in respect to number of errors 
made. 
TABLE G 
Net Effect of Tobacco on Mental Activity Involved in 
Cancellation Test 
The per cent of loss or gain, calculated according to the method 
described on page 194, for each test period on all the tobacco and all 
the control days taken together, is presented in this table. Plus 
means a gain in efficiency as a result of smoking, minus means a loss. 
Subjects who were non-smokers are denoted by the * sign. 
Subject 
No. 
Test I 
Test II 
Test III 
Average 
8* 
+ -78 
~ i-45 
— 1.61 
~ .78 
9* 
— 2.26 
— 7.02 
- .04 
- 3.10 
IO 
- 2.54 
— 2.40 
+ -47 
- 1.50 
ii 
+ 4.80 
+ 1-50 
- 4-90 
+ .40 
12 
— 2.60 
— 2.80 
+ .13 
— 1.80 
13 
— 4.20 
- 5.80 
- 3-90 
- 4.68 
14 
-2.85 
-3-18 
— 1.40 
- 2.49 
15 
+ 3-36 
+ -32 
— 1.04 
+ 1.19 
16 
+ 1-50 
- -99 
+ .83 
+ -44 
17 
— .21 
- -55 
- 3-54 
— 1.42 
18 
+ 3-88 
+ 3-25 
+ -52 
+ 2.54 
Averages 
- -03 
- i-73 
- 1.32 
— 1.02 
What effect has tobacco on memory? This can be 
determined, so far as the simplest aspect of memory 
is concerned, by testing the ability of a subject to re- 
produce what he sees or hears, first immediately after 
he sees or hears it, and then after varying periods of 
time have elapsed. In this investigation, a test was EFFECT OF TOBACCO ON INTELLECTUAL PROCESSES 
205 
TABLE H 
Net Effect of Tobacco on Accuracy in Cancellation Test 
The per cent of loss or gain, calculated according to the method 
described on page 194, for each test period on all the tobacco and 
all the control days taken together, is presented in this table. The 
+ sign means a gain in efficiency as a result of smoking, the — sign 
means a loss. Subjects who were non-smokers are denoted by the 
* sign. 
Subject 
No. 
Te 1I 
Test II 
Test III 
Average 
8* 
— 
183.30 
— 
116.70 
— 
200.00 
— 
161.1 
9* 
— 
70.60 
+ 
17.60 
— 
70.60 
— 
41.2 
IO 
— 
46.10 
+ 
17.40 
— 
70.20 
— 
44.60 
ii 
+ 
45-30 
+ 
90.70 
+ 
63.30 
+ 
66.70 
12 
+ 
85.40 
+ 
40.70 
— 
29.10 
+ 
31.00 
13 
+ 
70.70 
+ 
72-30 
+ 
99.20 
+ 
80.60 
14 
+ 
55-65 
+ 
7-53 
+ 
15-65 
+ 
26.40 
15 
+ 
27.40 
+ 
20.22 
+ 
79-51 
+ 
36.90 
l6 
— 
2.28 
+ 
106.85 
+ 
80.00 
+ 
61.14 
17 
— 
51.18 
— 
37-79 
— 
I3-38 
— 
33-85 
18 
— 
149-23 
— 
116.92 
— 
35-38 
— 
100.00 
Averages 
- 
38.02 
- 
9.26 
- 
25-54 
- 
7.09 
made by repeating to a subject a number of digits 
which he attempted to reproduce immediately after- 
ward. This test measured the subject’s ability to give 
constant attention while the digits were being pro- 
nounced to him, and to retain each digit in its proper 
order. The digits were read at the rate of one a second. 
A technique was employed which enabled the experi- 
menter to pronounce the digits at a uniform rate and 
with a uniform volume of voice. From six to ten 
digits were pronounced to the subject, depending upon 
his power of reproduction as it was discovered during 206 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
the first day’s tests. (The reader should bear in mind 
that the first day’s tests in all instances were utilized 
for the purpose of acquainting the subject with the 
procedure in each test and perfecting the technique, 
and so the results were not included in the final calcu- 
lations.) He was scored according to the number of 
Combinations of Digits Used in the Study of the Effect of 
Tobacco on the Memory Span 
95381674 
81273569 
25639417 
36429178 
16247359 
521483796 
172849356 
857946312 
263851749 
495732861 
2945768315 
3864721954 
1739584632 
9231486574 
1936274586 
36285941 
94713865 
79145862 
85463174 
31768249 
6938224x75 
261543798 
369581724 
926543187 
78x594263 
4823579167 
5682319743 
6342597815 
1792436852 
9463758127 
16375289 
73586192 
69517328 
26134759 
86231594 
928637415 
125943768 
276143985 
481573629 
736259841 
2648591738 
5291376481 
4976238152 
94682735x8 
8495736215 
47596823 
69873945 
73182549 
19258463 
58179436 
938643715 
491583726 
2846711359 
374269815 
738516493 
5861324791 
3582764918 
2469173581 
8429635712 
4951683726 
25987634 
69514273 
27368514 
15839476 
42635798 
928576143 
153728496 
746913528 
8154639^ 
374916829 
6473819527 
5936481726 
2961843571 
6283975418 
9281635746 
58439176 
15748693 
29175864 
75824139 
41526938 
382594176 
278364951 
638541927 
954867132 
429573861 
1652984372 
8426739514 
5724169843 
4718926359 
2149867538 
79148632 
96251473 
36425819 
62517948 
24935817 
749135826 
415378692 
635729148 
394762581 
856914372 
4365718291 
6127394587 
2853746913 
6748253917 
6571238491 
94318275 
42718396 
52941783 
82635471 
62973814 
873965142 
387561924 
493261857 
298345761 
726435198 
6753821495 
2583569714 
5492178361 
7594236814 
6183274958 
53176984 
26485317 
96432518 
42879153 
86941572 
718493265 
391524876 
648521937 
152496384 
579132648 
1538469274 
5962714382 
8143762957 
4657928139 
9243187564 
93864271 
39485762 
83527914 
62948375 
73591846 
138597264 
539648712 
628193745 
758316924 
942758631 
3546192784 
8643157293 
4783251962 
5821694731 
7564132896 
47128563 
36174298 
58192764 
85136427 
51692837 
176845932 
461573928 
851627943 
364291587 
726384915 
5914827638 
4631792587 
6593728143 
5437981629 
3612587491 
93846271 
37481965 
46729518 
13574296 
841353682 
697384125 
168237594 
213649758 
841927536 
918253467 
8734251964 
6587194238 
3574691826 
9831625471 
4639128759 
74659312 
38149725 
6925837X 
39725486 
13968245 
359426178 
9463271584 
159842765 
279468513 
517492634 
4286391759 
8146273592 
2518374693 
7562489314 
5917486837 
71582694 
25367918 
65972843 
48153627 
27415368 
391864275 
647183925 
795463281 
297165843 
593847268 
1384257962 
514269837s 
8591473624 
9136524876 
6253x79483 
92863715 
69247531 
16837459 
26753M8 
74135862 
643257918 
367418529 
146728333 
271358643 
958172634 
4761935829 
5426197836 
6958247135 
4951728362 
2937845613 
476i8359 
29168537 
98257361 
43678592 
54237698 
125468397 
981657433 
265984139 
796453825 
531642978 
3814592264 
1925836473 
9537841628 
7168592438 
5724163845 
36485291 
34827956 
41972538 
57384369 
86351472 
215896374 
658172392 
5781264931 
261758349 
7926831546 
3286947516 
8639751249 
1358274695 
9375241684 
7458693126 
15968273 
26374851 
95248316 
53849671 
72649385 
584217693 
6215394/8 
473698512 
385179462 
968751423 
8461923751 
5834761927 
1763549826 
9564728x32 
713524869s EFFECT OF TOBACCO ON INTELLECTUAL PROCESSES 
207 
perfect reproductions which he made in ten trials. The 
digits in each combination were arranged in chance 
order, as shown in the accompanying lists, so that there 
would not be similarity in any two combinations. 
The effects of tobacco on the memory span for digits 
for all subjects are shown in Table I. It can be seen 
that in the case of Subject No. 7 the net effect of to- 
bacco is negligible, only .8 per cent loss. In the case 
TABLE I 
Net Effect of Tobacco on Memory Span for Digits 
The per cent of loss or gain, calculated according to the method 
described on page 194, for each test period on all the tobacco and all 
the control days taken together is presented in this table. Plus 
means a gain in efficiency, minus means a loss as a result of smoking. 
Subjects who were non-smokers are denoted by the * sign. 
Subject 
No. 
Test I 
Test II 
Test III 
Average 
i* 
— 
2.20 
+ 
13.40 
+ 
18.00 
+ 
9.60 
2* 
— 
22.70 
— 
7.60 
— 
5.00 
— 
11.90 
3* 
+ 
II.60 
+ 
8.50 
— 
14.00 
+ 
1.70 
4* 
— 
1.20 
+ 
1.20 
— 
6.00 
— 
1.78 
5* 
— 
10.60 
— 
3.20 
— 
22.30 
— 
12.10 
6* 
— 
2.20 
+ 
6.80 
+ 
4-50 
+ 
3-40 
7* 
— 
2.4O 
+ 
5.20 
— 
6.20 
— 
.80 
8* 
— 
12.00 
— 
26.40 
— 
22.10 
— 
20.00 
9* 
— 
17.20 
— 
25.00 
— 
10.30 
— 
17.46 
IO 
— 
24.60 
— 
4-47 
— 
20.90 
— 
16.40 
ii 
+ 
15.80 
— 
11.20 
+ 
2.25 
+ 
8.90 
12 
— 
13.10 
— 
7.20 
— 
19.90 
— 
1340 
13 
+ 
22.00 
+ 
4.48 
+ 
21.90 
+ 
16.22 
H 
— 
33-62 
— 
14.79 
— 
35-56 
— 
27.99 
15 
— 
19.78 
— 
13-19 
— 
28.41 
— 
19.48 
16 
+ 
•55 
+ 
10.44 
+ 
2.08 
+ 
4-3i 
17 
— 
4-54 
+ 
5-88 
— 
1.20 
+ 
-13 
18 
.00 
+ 
8.78 
+ 
10.02 
+ 
6.18 
Averages 
— 
6.46 
— 
2.69 
— 
7.40 
— 
5-07 208 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
of Subject No. 12 the loss is more marked, though the 
average difference in all the tests on all the control days 
and the tobacco days was only .9. This is a loss of 13.4 
per cent of the normal performance. Subject No. 12’s 
performance on the last test showed a gain on the to- 
bacco days as compared with the control days, but he 
lost on the first two tests after the normal. 
What effect does tobacco have on intellectual func- 
tions involved in keeping three digits in mind and add- 
ing them successively to an original number? Any 
agent acting detrimentally upon intellectual processes 
would probably slow down the adding process and 
would increase the errors made in the addition. A high 
degree of efficiency in the performance of this task 
could not be attained by one whose intellectual processes 
were retarded or disturbed by any agent, for anything 
which would interfere with the associative processes 
would be revealed in decrease of rapidity and increase 
of errors in the performance of the test. 
The method of conducting this test was as follows: 
The experimenter called out to the subject a number, as 
25, and the subject was asked to add successively there- 
to 6, then 7, then 8, then 6, 7, 8 again, repeating the 
process as rapidly as possible for exactly thirty seconds. 
Then a new number, as 28, was called out to the sub- 
ject and he was asked to add 6, then 7, then 8, suc- 
cessively, repeating the cycle for thirty seconds. The 
entire task occupied five minutes. The effect of tobacco 
on the subject’s ability to perform this test was deter- EFFECT OF TOBACCO ON INTELLECTUAL PROCESSES 
209 
mined by comparing the correct number of combina- 
tions and the errors which he made on control days as 
compared with tobacco days. The experimenter had 
prepared sets of correct additions for all the numbers 
given the subject, and these were used in checking his 
responses. Errors in computation were placed beside 
the correct computation, and all the computations made 
after the first error were recorded so as to determine 
whether further errors were made. 
Net Effect of Tobacco on Speed in Performing Addition 
The per cent of loss or gain, calculated according to the method 
described on page 194, for each test period on all the tobacco and all 
the control days taken together is presented in this table. Plus 
means a gain in efficiency, minus means a loss. Subjects who were 
non-smokers are denoted by the * sign. 
TABLE J 
Subject 
No. 
Test I 
Test II 
Test III 
Average 
i* 
— 
1.70 
+ 
.84 
— 
77 
— 
•54 
2* 
— 
11.20 
— 
6.00 
— 
5.20 
— 
7.40 
3* 
+ 
5.10 
+ 
1.20 
+ 
3-50 
4- 
3.20 
4* 
— 
2.30 
— 
4-50 
— 
3 40 
— 
345 
5* 
— 
1.70 
+ 
•59 
— 
2.50 
— 
1.20 
6* 
— 
2.50 
— 
2.40 
— 
3.10 
— 
2.70 
7* 
— 
3-50 
— 
6.40 
— 
5-30 
— 
5-07 
8* 
— 
3.20 
— 
6.15 
— 
6.10 
— 
5.22 
9* 
— 
1.32 
— 
5.80 
— 
.61 
— 
2.58 
10 
+ 
5-48 
+ 
5.22 
+ 
11.09 
+ 
7.27 
ii 
+ 
1.80 
+ 
3.60 
+ 
4.60 
+ 
3-30 
12 
+ 
1.90 
— 
1.30 
+ 
5.10 
+ 
1.90 
13 
+ 
7.07 
+ 
6.07 
+ 13-00 
+ 
8.72 
14 
+ 
.81 
+ 
6.40 
+ 
1.68 
+ 
2.96 
15 
+ 
3-78 
+ 
6.00 
+ 
4-5i 
+ 
4-65 
16 
+ 
1.06 
+ 
4-39 
+ 
8.36 
+ 
4.60 
17 
— 
3-37 
+ 
5-13 
+ 
5-55 
+ 
2-43 
l8 
+ 
12.74 
+ 
973 
+ 
10.78 
+ 
11.07 
Averages 
+ 
•50 
+ 
•93 
+ 
2.29 
+ 
1.04 210 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
The effect of tobacco on the intellectual functions 
involved in adding in the manner described are shown 
for all subjects in Table J. In the case of Subject No. 
12 there is a slight gain—1.9 per cent—in ability to 
add, while in the case of Subject No. 7, there is a loss 
of about 5 per cent. The reliability of the result in the 
latter case is very high, but not quite so high in the case 
TABLE K 
Net Effect of Tobacco on Accuracy in Performing Addition 
The per cent of loss or gain, calculated according to the method 
described on page 194, for each test period on all the tobacco and all 
the control days taken together is presented in this table. Plus 
means a gain in efficiency, minus means a loss. Subjects who were 
non-smokers are denoted by the * sign. 
Subject 
No. 
Test I 
Test II 
Test III 
Average 
i* 
+ 53-30 
— 26.60 
+ 40.00 
+ 22.60 
2* 
+ 44-40 
+ 29.60 
+ 96.20 
4- 54-0° 
3* 
- 21.30 
+ 85.50 
+ 31-00 
4- 32.00 
4* 
+ 47-6o 
- 97.60 
— 40.40 
- 30.70 
5* 
- 31-60 
- 39-20 
- 17.70 
— 29.10 
6* 
+ 22.70 
+ 43-6o 
+ 13-60 
+ 29.50 
7* 
- 70.40 
- 55-40 
+ 15-00 
- 37.20 
8* 
- 77-90 
- 77-6o 
- 63.80 
— 72.90 
9* 
— 142.00 
- 99.10 
— 111.90 
— 117.60 
10 
+ 36.00 
+ 29.90 
+ 10.80 
+ 25.70 
ii 
- 35-io 
- 50.00 
— 26.70 
- 37-30 
12 
+ 54-oo 
+ 44-30 
+ 52-70 
+ 50.10 
13 
— 10.20 
+ 5-86 
+ 22.19 
+ 5-86 
14 
- 46.56 
— 6.71 
- 3i-i9 
— 28.06 
15 
- 11.38 
- 29.97 
— 16.98 
- I5-98 
l6 
- 23.52 
- 25-49 
+ 21.56 
- -941 
17 
+ 39.69 
+ 44-92 
+ 4-92 
+ 29.89 
l8 
+ 31-74 
+ 15-44 
+ 39-88 
4- 28.65 
Averages 
— 7.81 
- n-59 
+ 2.18 
- 5-55 EFFECT OF TOBACCO ON INTELLECTUAL PROCESSES 
211 
of Subject No. 12. The amount of gain or loss in 
either case can not be great. 
By glancing at Table J it will be seen that some 
subjects gained in ability to add while under the in- 
fluence of tobacco but other subjects lost. The gain, 
taking all subjects together, was greater than the loss, 
but it was not a large gain. All the smokers gained 
while all the non-smokers but one lost slightly. 
When it comes to the effect of tobacco on the ability 
of a person to resist error in performing addition, the 
results are shown for all subjects in Table K. In this 
table the + sign indicates that the errors made de- 
creased as compared with the normal performance for 
the day, while the — sign indicates that the subject 
made a greater number of errors. Subject No. 12 
made an average of .1 of an error less in all tests on all 
tobacco days as compared with the normal for these 
days, while he made an average of 1.45 errors more in 
all the tests on all the control days as compared with 
the normal performance for these days. This means 
that he gained on the tobacco days as compared with 
control days, 50 per cent; but Subject No. 7 lost 37.2 
per cent. The reliability of the results in the case of 
Subject No. 12 is greater than in the case of No. 7, so 
that tobacco was doubtless of actual value to Subject 
No. 12 in enabling him to resist the tendency to make 
errors, while it was a disadvantage to Subject No. 7. 
Table K shows that while tobacco increased the ability 
of some subjects to resist errors in addition and less- 
ened the ability of other subjects, still, taking all sub- 212 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
jects together, it proved to be detrimental, but not 
markedly so. 
It will doubtless be granted without argument that 
he is the most efficient individual mentally who can per- 
ceive a situation most rapidly and accurately and make 
an appropriate response to it most readily. Any agent 
that will impede or confuse his perceptive or reactive 
processes will lessen his efficiency. The Cancellation 
Test just, described measured the effect of tobacco on 
very elementary perceptive processes; the next—the 
Reading Reaction Test—measured the effect of tobacco 
on more complex perceptive and reactive processes. 
It measured the speed with which a subject could recog- 
nize and pronounce short, familiar words of four letters 
each. It will be apparent to anyone, whether or not 
he is familiar with psychological experimentation, that 
the time required to recognize and pronounce a short 
familiar word is exceedingly brief under all ordinary 
conditions, and in order to determine whether any 
agent like tobacco has a retarding effect on recognition 
and reaction, it is necessary to detect differences in time 
down to hundredths of a second. It was possible to 
accomplish this with a high degree of accuracy in this 
investigation. 
The apparatus used is shown in the accompanying 
photograph. It consists of a chronoscope for record- 
ing time, a “voice key,” an apparatus for exposing 
words so that they are clearly visible at regular Apparatus used in measuring the effect of tobacco on the time 
required for a subject to recognize and pronounce a word. EFFECT OF TOBACCO ON INTELLECTUAL PROCESSES 
213 
intervals for the subject to pronounce, and sets 
of four-letter words. The apparatus for exposing 
the words consisted of a revolving drum, upon which 
the bands containing the words were placed, and a 
pendulum for regulating the rate of exposures, which 
in this experiment was five seconds for each word. 
The instant a word was exposed through a small win- 
dow, the chronoscope was automatically set in motion 
by electricity. The subject pronounced the word 
as quickly as he recognized it. Immediately before his 
lips was placed a “voice key,” so sensitive that the 
vibrations of the voice broke the electric circuit con- 
trolling the chronoscope which was thus instantly 
stopped. In this manner the exact time from the instant 
of exposure of the word until it was spoken was re- 
corded in units of .0034 seconds. There were thirty 
of these records made at each test, and three tests each 
day after the normal test. The average time required 
for reading the words at each test was calculated, and 
this average was used as a measure of the performance 
for that test. At every second test the set of thirty 
words was rearranged in a chance order. Whenever 
the same arrangement was used at succeeding tests the 
series was always started at a different point, so that the 
subject could not learn the order and so could not an- 
ticipate what word would follow any particular 
exposure. 
The effect of tobacco on the mental functions meas- 
ured by the Reading Reaction test are presented for 214 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
all subjects in Table L. It may be noted that Sub- 
ject No. 11 lost slightly while under the influence of 
tobacco, the net loss being 2.5 per cent. While this 
is very low, the reliability is very high and we may say 
with confidence that it is a real loss. On the other 
hand, Subject No. 7 gained 2.78 per cent under the 
influence of tobacco and the reliability here is also 
high, so that we may say with equal confidence that this 
is a real gain of as much significance as the loss suf- 
fered by Subject No. 11. Referring to Table L, it 
TABLE L 
Net Effect of Tobacco on Reading Reaction Time 
The per cent of loss or gain, calculated according to the method 
described on page 194, for each test period on all the tobacco and all 
the control days taken together is presented in this table. Plus 
means a gain in efficiency as a result of smoking, minus means a loss. 
Subjects who were non-smokers are denoted by the * sign. 
Subject 
No. 
Test I 
Test II 
Test III 
Average 
i* 
- 5-8o 
~ 3-04 
~ 5 30 
~ 4-70 
2* 
+ 4-40 
+ 2.30 
+ 2.40 
+ 3-00 
3* 
+ 3-8o 
+ 2.70 
+ 3-8o 
+ 340 
4* 
+ .80 
+ .05 
+ 2.50 
+ 1.13 
5* 
— 2.90 
— 1.90 
— 1.60 
— 2.10 
6* 
+ 7-8o 
+ 3-20 
+ 3-90 
+ 470 
7* 
+ 4-32 
+ 3-21 
+ 326 
+ 2.78 
8* 
- -70 
-1.07 
+ .03 
- .49 
9* 
- 4-93 
- 6.93 
- 6.79 
- 5-96 
ii 
— 2.40 
— 2.70 
— 2.60 
- 2.50 
13 
+ 4-°8 
+ 3-74 
+ 2.55 
+ 346 
14 
- .46 
- i-37 
+ 2.68 
+ .28 
15 
+ 4-42 
- 1.14 
+ 442 
+ 2.66 
16 
- .78 
- .87 
— 2.42 
— 1.02 
17 
+ 1-99 
- .86 
+ .25 
+ 46 
l8 
+ .08 
+ 2.74 
+ .10 
+ .98 
Averages 
+ .86 
- -13 
+ 45 
+ 
00 EFFECT OF TOBACCO ON INTELLECTUAL PROCESSES 
215 
can be seen that, taking all the subjects together, there 
is gain from tobacco but it is negligible. 
We come now to the most complex mental function 
studied in this investigation. This had to do with the 
establishment of associations between new experiences, 
or learning. Mental efficiency depends in part upon 
rapidity and accuracy of perception and reaction, and 
in part upon faithful and enduring memory and ready 
recall; but it depends primarily upon rapidity and ac- 
curacy in establishing bonds between new experiences. 
The experiences of daily life are largely, though not 
wholly,.concerned with learning; that is, with connect- 
ing a series of experiences so that when one of them 
is re-presented those with which it was originally as- 
sociated may be recalled. The more readily one can 
establish such associations the more efficient he will be, 
other things being equal. Any agent that will lessen 
one’s ability to establish these associations readily and 
securely will prove a handicap to him, as any reader 
will readily grant; so that in our investigation of 
tobacco, it was deemed to be of supreme importance 
to endeavor to find out whether it helped or whether 
it hindered the learning process. 
In studies in psychological laboratories on learning, 
it is planned, as a rule, to measure the time that sub- 
jects require to establish connections between combi- 
nations of letters that do not make words—“non-sense 
words”—and materials or characters that do not sym- 
bolize any known objects—“non-sense materials.” The 
words and characters used in this test consisted of 216 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
non-sense syllables and non-sense characters, the latter 
all being of homogeneous geometrical forms, of which 
the following are examples: 
louz 
\/ab 
tus 
lur£ 
moog 
Non-sense characters worked out by Dr. Hull to test the effect 
of tobacco on the learning process. 
An elaborate system of both non-sense syllables and 
non-sense characters was worked out by Dr. Hull. 
These characters and syllables were exposed to the 
subject in the same manner as described on pp. 212-213 
where the method of determining the rapidity of read- 
ing isolated words was discussed. The exposure ap- 
paratus was made up of a drum, which was controlled 
by a pendulum, so that each character was exposed for 
a period of five seconds. At each test, the learner was 
confronted with a set of five characters and correspond- 
ing non-sense syllables, repeated six times in different 
orders. The subject was required to associate each of 
the five characters with its appropriate syllable in as EFFECT OF TOBACCO ON INTELLECTUAL PROCESSES 
217 
few repetitions as possible, so that when a particular 
character was presented, the appropriate syllable could 
be given at once. The five characters were placed on 
the band in a chance order to prevent the subject from 
associating the characters with a special position in 
the sequence. The greatest care was taken to have the 
characters at each learning period as distinct from each 
other as possible in the arrangement of the letters, etc., 
so that the subject would not confuse them. Thirty 
exposures were made at each test, which made it pos- 
sible to present the five characters and associated syl- 
lables in six different orders, as indicated above. The 
experimenter conducted the test by starting the appa- 
ratus which exposed the characters, telling the subject 
the name of each character in the middle of its five 
second exposure. On the second and subsequent ex- 
posures of the characters, the subject responded with 
the proper syllable for each character if he could; 
otherwise he was prompted until he had learned the 
combination. He was allowed two and one-half sec- 
onds to recall a syllable, and if he was unable to do it 
in this time, he was prompted. Special scoring blanks 
were provided for each band of characters, showing the 
name, position, and number of each character. A 
minus sign was recorded for a prompting, a brieve for 
a wrong response, and a plus sign when the correct syl- 
lable was given. As a measure of the subject’s per- 
formance, the total of wrong responses and promptings 
taken together was considered as his score. 
The effect of tobacco on the learning process is 218 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
shown for all subjects in Table M. Subject No. 12 lost 
in efficiency while under the influence of tobacco, as 
shown in the column of averages in Table M. The + 
TABLE M 
Net Effect of Tobacco on Facility in Learning 
The per cent of loss or gain, calculated according to the method 
described on page 194, for each test period on all the tobacco and 
all the control days taken together, is presented in this table. The 
+ sign denotes that the subject gained in efficiency as a result of 
smoking, and the — sign indicates a decrease in efficiency. Subjects 
who were non-smokers are denoted by the * sign. 
Subject 
No. 
Test I 
Test II 
Test III 
Average 
i* 
+ 
5-30 
— 2.60 
.00 
+ .800 
2* 
— 
2.60 
— 2.60 
— 12.90 
- 6.50 
3* 
— 
13.60 
+ 27.50 
4- 12.10 
+ 8.70 
4* 
— 
2.70 
— 20.00 
+ 8.57 
- 5-07 
5* 
— 
17.70 
- 5.80 
+ 3-38 
— 6.70 
6* 
— 
1550 
— 2.90 
— 18.40 
— 11.60 
7* 
+ 
5-27 
+ 32.60 
+ 13-07 
+ 16.90 
8* 
— 
16.50 
— 8.70 
— 8.70 
- 1370 
9* 
— 
4-30 
+ 25-50 
4- 19.00 
+ 13-38 
10 
+ 
45.80 
+ 5-20 
- 2.18 
+ 16.00 
ii 
— 
30.00 
+ 10.20 
.00 
- 6.50 
12 
— 
17-50 
- 31-20 
- 23.30 
- 23.90 
13 
— 
10-35 
+16.95 
+ 10.68 
+ 5-74 
14 
— 
.61 
+ 4-47 
- 33-00 
- 9-71 
IS 
— 
2.66 
- 39-54 
- 30-73 
- 24-33 
16 
— 
33-85 
- 12.39 
- 15-93 
— 21.17 
17 
— 
3-03 
+ 21.05 
+ 16.25 
+ 8.37 
18 
— 
1.66 
- 34-05 
- 25.14 
- 20.25 
Averages 
- 
6.46 
- *9i 
- 4-84 
- 4 42 
sign in this table denotes a gain in the rapidity and 
accuracy of learning at any test compared with the nor- 
mal for the day, while a — sign shows loss of rapidity 
and accuracy. The net effect of tobacco on Subject EFFECT OF TOBACCO ON INTELLECTUAL PROCESSES 
219 
No. 12 was a loss of 23.9 per cent of his normal per- 
formance. On the other hand, Subject No. 7 while 
under the influence of tobacco gained about 17 per cent 
over his normal performance. Some of the subjects 
lost in efficiency under the influence of tobacco, while 
others gained, though taken as a whole the losses were 
greater than the gains, as the averages show. CHAPTER XIII 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY CONCLUSIONS 
A. In the Case of Mature Persons 
I. In the laboratory tests, a technique was devised 
which made it possible to measure the mental effects 
of tobacco as a drug acting independently of other 
agents. The results show that tobacco tends to retard 
and to disturb intellectual processes, but not in a marked 
degree in the case of the particular functions which 
were investigated. There is considerable variability in 
the effects upon any one individual from day to day and 
in respect to different intellectual processes. The vari- 
ability is so great that it is necessary to keep a subject 
under experimentation for many days without inter- 
mission in order to detect a trend in the effects of to- 
bacco. The variability is equally pronounced among 
different individuals—so pronounced, in fact, that a 
considerable number of individuals must be put through 
elaborate experimental tests in order to observe a defi- 
nite tendency in the influence which tobacco exerts on 
intellectual functions. It is impossible to say what the 
effect of smoking a pipe of tobacco would be upon the 
mental processes of any individual at any given time. 
220 TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
221 
The data from the psychological laboratory do not 
show that a pipe of tobacco will uniformly retard and 
disturb intellectual processes in the case of any person. 
However, it can be said that, taking a large number 
of individuals, tobacco will slow down and disturb the 
intellectual processes of the majority of them, as shown 
in Table N. 
II. The effect of tobacco varies in different in- 
dividuals according to the time which elapses between 
smoking and intellectual performance. With some in- 
dividuals the immediate effect of tobacco appears to 
be beneficial, while the remoter effect may be det- 
rimental. With other individuals the immediate 
effect is depressing, while the remoter effect may be 
neutral or, rarely, stimulating. It is impossible to say 
in any individual case whether the immediate or the 
remote effect of tobacco will be stimulating or de- 
pressing. The effect is not likely to be uniform in 
the case of any individual in respect to all intellectual 
functions. 
III. Only the simpler intellectual processes and 
those that could be accurately measured under labo- 
ratory conditions were studied in this investigation. 
These processes are all essential to mental efficiency, 
but there are other functions equally essential which 
could not be investigated because they could not be 
controlled and measured under laboratory conditions. 
The distinguished men and women whose testimonies The reader can appreciate the verdict of the laboratory best by examining the table given below, Table 
N, in which are presented the net effects of tobacco upon all subjects in respect to the functions examined. 
The net effect is stated in the form of the percentage of loss or gain, calculated according to the method de- 
scribed on page 194, in the particular function under consideration, in all tests for all days, the + sign denoting 
gain and the — sign loss under the influence of tobacco. Non-smoking subjects are designated by * sign. 
Averages 
0'Ca4* CO to H O O 00OsCn 4* Co K) h 
********* 
Subject 
No. 
+ 
Os 
£ 
o 
++++++++l+++ 
H 
VO VO Co oocn Co -P* OCn Co 
Co b h ca 
Co C/i 00 *4 Co O' o cn to 
Rate of 
Pulse Beat 
1 
Oj 
CA 
1 + 1 + 1 1 1 i 1 1 1 1 1 + 1 1 + 
to H H H to to to Co M H M CO 
b w bo6i 4* 4* Co bb ooCO bo CMO 
U) to 0+*Cm CCvj Co O' O c/1 l/i^OO 
Rapidity of 
Tapping 
1 
cn 
Os 
+1 1 ++1 + ++1+++ 1 
* ' W M tO * tO 
Cn O-J *o *0 to to , . moi 0'+- 00 o . Co 
b O Co * Cn b cn bobcnCobbo 4* 
. • • • O 
Muscular 
Fatigue 
1 
M 
to 
1 +1 1 1 +1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 
01 M H £ K (o Oo M H H M ’ " 
M \ LU O'Crt O' w -f* 0J 4* 
« • • 
Steadiness of 
Motor Control 
l 
H 
o 
to 
+ I++I11+111 
vi 4* m 4* O' In H^J 
4*. O O 00 00 
Rapidity of 
Cancellation 
1 
z 
iI+++I++Iii 
S Co O'Co to oo Co O' 4* Sv 
§ CO M O' O' O M M Z? 
• bo m b bs * O'w ■ 
Cn 
Accuracy in 
Cancellation 
1 
CA 
o 
+++ii+i+iiii+ii+i+ 
M M M M H H |0 M M 
cn A'O-ti O'Co 00 O . CO to m m M o 
m m Co 4* b to 4* b 4* 4* M -o b b 
OCCO M OOO to Os O oo o 
Memory Span 
+ 
o 
+++++++++11111l+l1 
M 
m toA-ps- m 00 M Co -J to Cn Cn to m Co Co -4 
0 4. O'O' bcotocntob*'4to4*io4».cn 
-4 Co O Cn Co to 0010-4 Cn O 4^ 
Rapidity of 
Addition 
- 5-55 
++IiI++I+Iil+lI+++ 
to to M to OOCn 
00O SO C/i ocn Cl M vJ'O'O O to to 
b b o bo m Co **4 kb i>jcn h V * bs 
Cn so m 00 O' Qs w O 
Accuracy in 
Addition 
+ 
Co 
00 
++i+++• i • i i++1+++i 
m to Co. to . cn to to m Co Co 
0 4* O b to 4* cn b + h h ’ *4 
oo O'to O'oo O'• • 0"0 00 Co O 
Reading 
Reaction Time 
1 
A 
to 
i+iii+i1++1+1ii+i+ 
to to to Cn to mmmmw 
O Oo m 4-* O Vj Co O' O'Co Co O' h O'Cn oo O' 
to oj m co b b oi ’ Co b b bb o b cn bo 
Ol'O'JCO H oo 
Facility in 
Learning 
+ 
to 
Co 
+1+++ II++ +11 
SO Oj to 4* , . . # # . to m , 4* 
bb o oj o b « to o b cn 4* 
• Co Cn 0"0 * * * 4* to 4* 4*- * • O' 
Learning 
Reaction Time 
1 
UY 
Co 
1++11+++1111111++1 
M to to 
O to m O' toCn oo to Co Co to O'Co -4 4* 
cn b m b b ho O boMCnb4*biocnbto 
GO go to O' h 4- Vi o O to -J to 04 m to 4_* 
Averages 
TABLE N—Summary of Laboratory Data. 
222 TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
223 
are reviewed in Chapters III and IIV occasionally 
refer to the process of meditation. For illustration, 
the reader may glance at the testimony of Author C, 
Group VII, Chapter IV. Those who speak of the 
matter say without exception that smoking is favor- 
able to meditation. The laboratory tests have yielded 
no data relating specifically to this process. All the 
processes studied in the laboratory were compara- 
tively active, dynamic, aggressive. Meditation is a 
more passive and selective process. A few authors 
use the term “reflection” in the same sense in which 
other authors use “meditation.” In either case the 
process consists principally in the selection of ideas 
as they come spontaneously into the focus of con- 
sciousness and as they are related to a dominant interest 
or objective. When an individual is meditating he is 
not aggressively exploring and organizing his ex- 
periences, with a view to choosing some and discarding 
others according as they do or do not fit into or 
complete a pattern or system which he is holding in 
consciousness. He sits back, as it were, and lets ideas 
present themselves, to some extent in a chance order, 
and those that easily harmonize with the pattern he 
is holding in mind he retains and the others he lets 
go their way. Now, it is within reason to suppose 
that tobacco may facilitate this process of meditation 
in some cases. It may slow down intellectual processes 
just enough to permit of a certain spontaneity in the 
flow of ideas. Many of the authors quoted in Chapters 
III and IV say that tobacco “soothes their nerves,” 224 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
or “puts them in a peaceful attitude,” or “relieves their 
tension,” or “quiets the mind.” These phenomena are 
all of a kind, and they may be related to the intellectual 
process of meditation or reflection. Tobacco as a drug 
might in a particular individual retard and disturb the 
reasoning process, which may be regarded as an aggres- 
sive, dynamic, effortful function, while at the same 
time it might encourage meditation or reflection, which 
should be regarded more as a watchful-waiting 
process. 
IV. The laboratory tests yield no answer to the 
question, Does tobacco strengthen or does it weaken 
creative ability? For our purpose we may regard 
creative ability as the most dynamic and aggressive 
of the intellectual functions. The testimonies of men 
and women of distinction, and particularly of employers 
of men, are conflicting in respect to this matter. 
Literary people, who are smokers, say that tobacco 
facilitates creative activities, while some of the scien- 
tific and engineering authors say that tobacco dulls 
creative ability. The head of a great advertising 
agency claims that every man in his organization of 
first-rate ability is a non-smoker. An eminent biologi- 
cal scientist says that most of the scientific men who 
are leading in research use tobacco, while an equally 
eminent biological scientist gives exactly opposite testi- 
mony. We cannot secure conclusive evidence, either, 
from a study of the work of the leaders in thought 
and action during the past three hundred years. Some TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
225 
of them have used tobacco while others have not, the 
balance being somewhat in favor of the former. 
Leading reformers, who should be regarded as 
creative thinkers, have quite generally been non- 
smokers; but the men who have created new nations, 
new types of government, who have welded nations 
together, and who have in other ways exhibited 
marked creative ability have often been smokers. Going 
back to earlier times, though, we find, of course, that 
the men and women who established the bases of civi- 
lization did not have access to tobacco; all the founda- 
tions were laid and the superstructure was practically 
completed before jtobacco was discovered. No one, 
then, can maintain that tobacco has been essential, nor 
can any one say that it has been detrimental to creative 
activity in any field. In individual cases and in special 
pursuits, it may be detrimental; we cannot overlook the 
testimony bearing upon this matter given by men of 
large experience. But viewing creative activity in the 
large, it may be said that we simply do not know 
whether tobacco is an aid or is a hindrance, or whether 
it is neutral. It seems impossible to subject creative 
activity to accurate and thorough-going laboratory 
investigation, because the conditions necessary for 
laboratory measurement would prevent the activity 
we wish to study. If an individual is to be given 
opportunity to exercise creative activity he cannot be 
circumscribed, as he must be in laboratory work, so as 
to keep all factors uniform, except the one factor of 
indulgence in or abstinence from tobacco. 226 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
V. The laboratory data yield no answer to the ques- 
tion, Does tobacco improve or does it injure judg- 
ment? As the term is used here, one has good judg- 
ment if in view of a given situation he reacts so as 
to secure the highest degree of harmony. He has poor 
judgment if his action results in a high degree of con- 
flict. Stated in another way—one has good judgment 
if he so acts under varying conditions that the happi- 
ness of himself and his fellows will be promoted. He 
has poor judgment if he so acts that there will be 
an increase of pain or distress for himself or for his 
fellows. “Meditation” and “reflection” denote the 
same function as “judgment,” as the latter term is 
used by some persons; but as it is most commonly 
used, it does not imply meditation or reflection so much 
as effective response to a given situation. 
One cannot secure a satisfactory answer to the 
question, Does tobacco promote or does it interfere 
with good judgment? by a review of the activities of 
the world’s leaders in the past. Of course, tobacco 
could not have been essential to good judgment in 
earlier times or the race of men could not have sur- 
vived. On the other hand, since tobacco was discov- 
ered, many of the men who have exhibited the best 
judgment in important affairs have heen smokers. 
Some of the most successful men in every line of 
human endeavor to-day are smokers and some are 
non-smokers; there seem to be about as many in one 
group as in the other. 
The writer has asked a number of his colleagues in TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
227 
various departments of learning whether the men who 
lived before tobacco was discovered had as good judg- 
ment as the men who have lived since that time, and 
there have been as many different responses as there 
have been persons asked. It seems impossible to secure 
any consensus of opinion regarding the relative valid- 
ity of judgments made by the race before tobacco was 
discovered, as compared with those made since it came 
into general use. 
VI. In a number of the testimonies of distinguished 
men reference is made to the effect of tobacco upon 
“alertness.” Tobacco appears in some cases to stim- 
ulate the individual so that he is more wide-awake 
and responsive than he is without it; but in other cases 
it is said to produce laziness and satisfaction with 
mediocre achievement. The laboratory tests have not 
yielded data bearing explicitly upon “alertness,” but 
one would expect that retardation in perception and 
the learning process would tend to reduce alertness. 
On the other hand, the laboratory tests show that to- 
bacco frequently counteracts fatigue to a slight extent. 
In some cases, smoking refreshes an individual and so 
increases his endurance and power of work. As a 
rule, an individual is less alert when he is fatigued 
than when he is refreshed, and those persons whose 
endurance is promoted by tobacco would in the long 
run be more alert under its influence than without it. 
The effects either way are not marked, and there is 
no uniformity among individuals in respect to these 228 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
matters. But given a large number of individuals and 
the tendency of tobacco, though slight, would be to re- 
duce alertness. It is impossible to say in any particular 
case, however, whether an individual while under its 
influence would be more or would be less responsive 
to the world about him. 
VII. In many of the testimonials given in Chapters 
III and IV, reference is made to various general func- 
tions which have a bearing upon mental efficiency, 
but which were not investigated directly in the psy- 
chological laboratory. Some of the authors state that 
tobacco lessens “ambition.” One says that it takes 
the “gumption” out of a man and leaves him indifferent 
and lazy. Reference is frequently made, also, to the 
effect of tobacco on “irritability.” The majority of 
the smokers maintain that its effect is soothing, so that 
one is less irritable under its influence than without it. 
On the other hand, a few of the authors claim that 
tobacco appears to make them nervous, which is shown 
in their inability to sleep soundly, or to concentrate 
upon mental tasks after smoking, and so they have 
given it up, or at least have lessened the amount of 
tobacco which they consume. A distinguished engineer 
has stated that the productivity of engineers is depend- 
ent in considerable measure upon the quantity of to- 
bacco they consume; a reduction in the amount of 
smoking leads to increase in production. A number 
of the authors quoted claim that they can accomplish 
more without tobacco than with it. The majority of TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
229 
authors, however, are helped rather than hindered by 
tobacco in performing their tasks. Literary men and 
women, allowing for exceptions, believe that they are 
more productive when assisted by tobacco than when 
deprived of it. Closely allied to the question of the 
effect of tobacco upon productivity is its effect on 
“vitality.” Several authors say that in their cases 
tobacco lessens vitality. They do not feel as vigorous 
and as capable when they smoke as when they abstain. 
Taking all these matters together, it may be said 
that, so far as reliance can be placed on the testi- 
mony of men and women, tobacco exerts a slightly 
detrimental effect upon certain general attitudes, feel- 
ings, or conditions affecting mental efficiency. It can- 
not be said that this would be true in any individual 
case; but given a large number of cases, the tendency 
would be in this direction. It would not be marked. 
An observer could not ordinarily detect its depressing 
influence upon another person, though he might de- 
tect it in his own case. The majority of employers of 
men for work demanding mental efficiency say that 
they have been unable to observe that tobacco either 
retards or accelerates mental activities, or helps or 
hinders a man in the performance of his tasks; but there 
are exceptions, as the reader may recall by re-reading 
the testimony of Authors G and I, Group III, and 
Author D, Group IX. It should be noted that em- 
ployers do not claim that tobacco makes employees more 
efficient, and so far as known, employers do not fur- 
nish tobacco to men in the belief that it improves their 230 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
efficiency. In this connection, it should be borne in 
mind that several great industrial and commercial 
organizations that employ large numbers of boys have 
adopted the policy of refusing to engage any boy who is 
addicted to tobacco, especially in the form of cigarettes; 
but we are here dealing with the effect of tobacco upon 
mature and not upon immature individuals. The latter 
problem will receive attention a little farther along. 
VIII. The general conclusion to be drawn from a 
study of the habits of men of the past and the tes- 
timonies of men and women of the present is that 
tobacco is not detrimental to the mental efficiency of 
some individuals, though it may be a detriment to 
others. Such a conclusion is open to debate, however, 
since it is impossible to determine whether capable 
men and women who smoke would achieve more and 
on a higher plane, or less and on a lower plane, than 
they now do if they should abstain from tobacco. The 
leading men of the past who indulged in tobacco might 
have accomplished more or they might have accom- 
plished less than they did if they had refrained from 
its use. There is no way to secure accurate data with 
which to solve these problems. The most that one 
can say is that in all probability tobacco is not an in- 
superable barrier to the attainment of the highest effi- 
ciency on the part of some persons, but it may be a 
barrier to the attainment of efficiency on the part of 
other persons. It is possible that the reason some 
mediocre men and women have not achieved distinc- TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
231 
tion is because they have used tobacco; but 
there are mediocre men and women who do not use it, 
and a friend of tobacco might very well say that if 
they had indulged in it they would have risen above 
their fellows by their achievements, like the distin- 
guished men and women who do use it. The writer 
has had all these arguments presented to him fre- 
quently since he began this investigation, and there is 
no convincing reply that can be made to persons who 
advance such views. 
At this point, will the reader kindly re-read Chapter 
V, in which an attempt is made to estimate the value 
of biographical and testamentary data and to explain 
and qualify conflicting testimonies regarding the effects 
of tobacco on mental efficiency. 
B. In the Case of Immature Persons 
IX. The testimony of principals and high-school 
faculties is uniformly to the effect that tobacco is a 
detriment to scholarship in the high school. The prin- 
cipals and faculties who cooperated in this investiga- 
tion apparently made an earnest effort to observe the 
facts with an eye single to the truth in respect to the 
effect of tobacco on the intellectual work of pupils, 
and to report these facts without bias or prejudice. 
X. School records studied over a long period of time 
corroborate the testimony of principals and high-school 
faculties. When a pupil begins the use of tobacco 
the chances are that his intellectual work will decline 
in comparison with a boy who abstains from tobacco. 232 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
This is not true in all cases, but the correlation between 
tobacco and low scholarship is sufficiently high to war- 
rant the statement that there is a marked relation of 
cause and effect between them. 
XI. It has been frequently said to the writer during 
this investigation that the comparatively inferior 
scholarship of pupils who smoke is not due to the 
direct effect of tobacco as a drug, but to the loafing 
habits which boys acquire who engage in smoking. 
For our purpose it is not necessary to debate this ques- 
tion, though the probabilities ar€ that in the case of 
high-school boys there is a direct drug effect of tobacco 
which slows down intellectual processes. But granting 
that the drug effect is negligible, if tobacco induces 
habits of intellectual relaxation or lassitude, the out- 
come will be just as disastrous to efficiency in school 
tasks as if it directly impeded mental work. 
XII. The principals and high-school faculties co- 
operating in this investigation made a detailed bio- 
graphical report upon a large number of pupils, de- 
scribing their intellectual work before and after they 
began smoking. These reports have high value, and 
they show conclusively, it seems, that decline in the 
quality of intellectual work began in most cases with 
initiation into the use of tobacco. 
XIII. It has been frequently said to the writer that 
smokers among pupils are naturally inferior intellec- 
tually to non-smokers, and that their inferiority would TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
233 
have been detected before they began smoking if any 
one had given the matter attention. Intelligence tests 
apparently disprove this view. So far as intelligence 
tests can reveal native intellectual ability, smokers are 
at least as well endowed as non-smokers. Further, the 
testimonies of principals and high-school teachers war- 
rant the conclusion that smokers among high-school 
pupils were not, as a rule, inferior in scholarship before 
they began smoking. All the evidence indicates that 
tobacco exerts a retarding and disturbing influence 
upon the intellectual processes of high-school pupils. 
XIV. This investigation, so far as it concerned high- 
school pupils, was confined to the type of mental effi- 
ciency which was involved in school work. No effort 
was made to determine whether smokers were inferior 
or were superior to non-smokers in extra-school activ- 
ities. It is not known whether pupils who use tobacco 
are more prominent in activities outside of school than 
are those who do not use tobacco. It is conceivable 
that a pupil who uses tobacco might be affected un- 
favorably in his intellectual tasks in school, but he 
might be a social favorite outside of school, and he 
might be more efficient as a leader of a group than a 
non-smoking pupil. The writer attempted to investi- 
gate this matter in a number of schools, but he became 
convinced in the course of the investigation that the 
data supplied by teachers and by pupils themselves were 
so indefinite, so variable, and so unreliable that no use 
could be made of them. 234 
TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
XV. A few investigations of the effect of tobacco 
on the scholarship of college and university students 
lead to the conclusion that tobacco is a detriment to 
the intellectual work of college students as well as of 
high-school pupils. The data derived from the psy- 
chological laboratory would indicate that this detri- 
mental influence is due, at least in part, to the direct 
repressant drug effect of tobacco. It is probably also 
due in some measure to the distracting social influences 
associated with the use of tobacco. 
XVI. Many of the men who have given testimony 
regarding the effect of tobacco on their own intellectual 
processes state that they believe tobacco is injurious to 
immature persons. They say they would advise any 
boy not to smoke until he reaches maturity. Most of 
these men did not begin smoking before they were 
twenty-one, though a few of them began earlier. 
Three commenced before their fifteenth year, and have 
used tobacco freely since then. They do not say that 
they think they were handicapped in their mental devel- 
opment by the use of tobacco before they were mature. 
One judge who has large experience with wayward 
boys says that the harmful influence of cigarettes on 
young persons has been exaggerated. The consensus 
of opinion, though, in all the groups is very strongly 
against the use of tobacco in any form by young per- 
sons. 
XVII. The data secured in this investigation from 
principals and high-school faculties and from school TOBACCO AND MENTAL EFFICIENCY 
235 
records, together with the conclusions reached, cor- 
roborate the data and the conclusions, with but minor 
exceptions, presented in Chapter VI by various inves- 
tigators who have studied the problem of the effect of 
tobacco on the intellectual work of high-school pupils 
from many different angles. 
XVIII. That the use of tobacco by high-school 
pupils is regarded by principals and faculties as a seri- 
ous problem to be reckoned with in the administration 
of a school is evidenced by the fact that eighty per 
cent of the schools participating in this investigation 
have taken and are still taking definite measures to 
lessen the use of tobacco by pupils. The most common 
method of meeting the situation is by forbidding boys 
who ’smoke to participate in athletic games and con- 
tests, or to represent the school in any way. Some 
schools have made rules prohibiting the use of tobacco 
on the school grounds and on the way to and from 
school. Some have sought assistance from women’s 
clubs, commerce clubs, and similar organizations in the 
communities in which the schools are located. In 
others, the problem is handled by appealing to smokers 
individually to abandon the habit. In still others, pub- 
lic and class lectures are given in which the detrimental 
effect of tobacco on scholarship is discussed. In one 
way or another principals and faculties of schools in 
which there is much smoking are trying to remove 
what they believe to be an insuperable barrier to the 
success of their efforts in the schoolroom. BIBLIOGRAPHY 
There is a vast amount of literature relating to various 
aspects of tobacco. As stated previously, the investigation 
described in this volume has relation mainly to the effects of 
tobacco upon intellectual functions; but most of the books 
and articles in which reference is made to the effects of 
tobacco upon the mind discuss physiological, medical, eco- 
nomic, and other aspects of the tobacco question. In the 
Bibliography which follows, it has been thought best to in- 
clude the more important books and articles which treat of 
the effects of tobacco upon mental processes, even though 
they discuss other phases of the general subject as well. 
Books or articles have not been included which are devoted 
entirely to the discussion of physiological, medical, economic, 
or historical aspects of tobacco. 
The Bibliography is presented in three parts: first, books; 
second, signed articles; and third, important unsigned articles 
in magazines. In the course of this investigation, the writer 
examined a large number of unsigned editorials and articles 
in magazines and newspapers, and it seemed inadvisable to 
mention any but the most important of these writings. Books 
and signed articles are arranged alphabetically according to 
authors, and unsigned articles are arranged alphabetically 
according to the magazines in which they appear. The titles 
of a few very old books are given for the purpose principally 
of showing the interest that people have had in tobacco since 
it was introduced into Europe. 
It should be added that a number of books and articles 
containing some reference to the mental effects of tobacco 
had to be omitted from the Bibliography because of lack 
of space. An exhaustive Bibliography would fill a very 
large volume. The books and articles listed in this Bibliog- 
237 238 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 
raphy, however, include all those that the writer believes to 
be of importance. Those that have been eliminated appar- 
ently do not present any different points of view or any data 
which might lead to different conclusions from those which 
are presented in the books and articles listed here. It should 
be added that only works written in English are included. 
The writer is not aware of any investigations or any views 
presented in foreign languages which have not been de- 
scribed and summed up in the books and articles mentioned 
below. 
I. Books 
Acosta. “Naturall and Morall Historic of the Indies.” 
Edited by Charles R. Markham, London, 1880. 
Alcott, William. “Tobacco: Its Physical, Intellectual and 
Moral Effects on the Human System.” New York, 
Fowler, 1878. 
Allen, C. B. and M. A. “The Man Wonderful in the 
House Beautiful.” New York, 1883. 
Apperson, E. “The Social History of Smoking.” New 
York, Putnam, 1916. 
Bain, A. W. “Tobacco: Its History and Associations, Use 
and Abuse, including an account of the plant, and its 
modes of Use in all Ages and Countries; Shewing it to 
be the Solace of the King and the Beggar.” Compris- 
ing Prints and Woodcuts; Portraits of renowned 
Smokers; Tobacco Papers; Numberless Cuttings and 
Extracts; Pipes, Cigars, Snuff, and Snuff Boxes, and 
all the Smoker’s Paraphernalia; Statistics of Consump- 
tion, Revenue, etc., in Relation to this Wonderful weed, 
and in fact every conceivable item of interest that could 
be gathered in relation to the subject. The result of over 
thirty years’ labour and arranged in 17 large folio vol- 
umes, with specially printed title pages; 1836. Listed in 
Bragge’s Collection. 
Bain, John, and Werner, Carl. “Cigarettes in Fact and 
Fancy.” Boston, H. M. Caldwell Co., 1906, 190 pp. 
Bain, John. “Tobacco Leaves.” 1903. BIBLIOGRAPHY 
239 
Baldwin, A. “A Looking-Glass for Smokers; or, the Danger 
of the Needless or Intemperate Use of Tobacco. Col- 
lected from the Author’s Nine Years’ Observation, after 
he came to Manhood. In which the lawful Use of it is 
approved, the Abuse of it reproved; Directions to them 
that have a mind to leave it and Cautions to those that 
never took it. A Poem. London, printed for A. Bald- 
win in Warwick Lane, 1703. Bragge’s Collection. 
Barrie, Sir James M. “My Lady Nicotine.” London, 1890. 
Beer, George. “Origins of the British Colonial System.” 
Macmillan, New York, 1908. 
Bickerton, W. “A Pipe of Tobacco.” In Imitation of Six 
Several Authors. The Third Edition, with Notes. Lon- 
don, printed for W. Bickerton, 1744, 21 pp. Bragge’s 
Collection. 
Billings, E. “Tobacco, its history, varieties, culture and 
manufacture.” Hartford, 1875, 486 pp. 
Blanchard, E. “A Pipe of Tobacco with Whiffs and 
Clouds.” With illustrations. London, H. Beal, circa, 
1865, 66 pp. Bragge’s Collection. 
Blount, Sir Henry, and Howell, James. “Judge Ram- 
say’s Instrument to Cleanse the Stomacke as also Divers 
new Experiments of the Vertue of Tobacco and Coffee: 
How much they conduce to preserve Humane Health, 
Recommended to Public View.” The third Edition with 
new additions. London, printed for S. Speed, at the 
Rainbow in Fleet Street, near the Inner Temple-gate, 
* 1664. Bragge’s Collection. 
Bragge, William. “Bibliotheca Nicotiana.” A catalogue of 
books about tobacco, published by himself, at Birming- 
ham, England, 1880. 
Brennan, William. “Tobacco Leaves—book of facts for 
smokers.” Menasha, Wisconsin, 1915, 222 pp. 
Campbell, F. “Commentary of the Influence of Tobacco.” 
Sydney, 1853, 206 pp. 
Cartwright, Thomas. “Why Boys Should not Smoke.” 
■* London, 1904. 
Cavendish. “To all who smoke. A few words on defence 240 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 
of tobacco; or a plea for the Pipe.” London, Bailey 
Brothers, 1857, 96 pp. Bragge’s Collection. 
Chase, B. W. “Tobacco, its physical, mental, moral and 
social influences.” New York, 1878. 
Clarke, Adam. “A Dissertation on the Use and Abuse of 
Tobacco.” Salem, Thomas and Whipple, 1797, 24 pp. 
Evans, J. “Tobacco: its history, production, manufacture, 
properties and relation to Christianity.” Kewanee, Illi- 
nois, 1877. 
Fairholt, Frederick. “Tobacco, its History and Associa- 
tions.” London, 1859. Preface. 
Fink, B. “Tobacco.” New York, Abingdon Press, 1915, 
123 pp. 
Fisher, Irving, and Fisk, E. L. “How to Live,” Notes on 
“Tobacco,” New York, 1919. 
Fisher, George J., and Berry, Elmer. “The Physical Ef- 
fects of Tobacco.” Y. M. C. A. Association Press. 
Fiske, John. “Tobacco and Alcohol.” New York, Leypoldt 
and Holt, 1869, 163 pp. 
Ford, Henry. “The Case Against the Little White Slaver.” 
1916. 
Grymston. “Speech in Parliament upon the Accusation and 
Impeachment of William Laud, Arch-Bishop of Canter- 
bury, upon High Treason. Most unworthily trucked and 
chaffered in Tobacco, Licenses and Fines.” London, 
1641. Bragge’s Collection. 
Hatton, J. “Cigarette Paper for After Dinner Smoking.” 
Philadelphia, 1892. 
Hill, J. “Cautions against the immoderate Use of Snuff, 
founded on the known Qualities of the Tobacco Plant; 
and the Effects it must produce when this Was taken 
into the Body; and Enforced by Instances of persons 
who have perished miserably of Diseases, occasioned 
or rendered incurable by its Use.” Bragge’s Collection. 
Hubbard, Elbert. “The Cigarettist.” 1909. 
Hutchings, W. M. “Smoking to the Glory of God.” A 
letter to the Reverend C. H. Spurgeon in reply to his 
Apology for Smoking. London, 1874. Bragge’s Col- 
lection. bibliography 
241 
Jackson, James. “Tobacco and its effect.” Danville, N. Y., 
1864, 43 PP- 
James, I. “A Counterblaste to Tobacco.” London, 1602. 
Kellogg, John Harvey. “Tobaccoism or How Tobacco 
Kills.” Battle Creek, 1922, 162 pp. 
Lane, Benjamin. “The Mysteries of Tobacco.” New York, 
John Wiley, 1851, 156 pp. 
Lawrence, M. (Meta Lander). “Tobacco Problem.” Bos- 
ton, 1885, 279 pp. 
Ledswell, H. H. “The Tobacco Habit.” Published by J. 
and A. Churchill, 1912, 7 Great Marlborough Street, 
London. 
McKeever, William. “The Cigarette Smoking Boy.” Man- 
hattan, Kansas, 1909. 
Man, Thomas. “A Defence of Tobacco: with a friendly 
Answer to the late printed Booke called Works for 
Chimney-Sweepers.” London, printed by Richard Field 
for Thomas Man, 1602. Bragge’s Collection. 
Meller, Henry. “Nicotiana; or the Smoker’s and Snuff 
Taker’s Companion, Containing the History of Tobacco; 
Culture, Medical Qualities, and the Laws relative to its 
Importation and Manufacture.” With an Essay in its 
Defense. London, Effingham Wilson, Royal Exchange, 
1833. Bragge’s Collection. 
Murray, John C. “Smoking; when injurious, when innoc- 
uous, when beneficial, Containing the History of To- 
bacco; with Compendium of the Temperaments, showing 
how they are influenced by Tobacco.” London, Simpkin 
Marshall and Co., 1871. Bragge’s Collection. 
. “Narcotia; or the Pleasures of Imagination, Mem- 
ory, and Hope, united in the Philosophy of Tobacco. A 
Poem.” London, Whittaker and Co., 1857, 24 PP* 
Bragge’s Collection. 
Pack, F. J. “Tobacco and Human Efficiency.” 
Parton, James. “Smoking and Drinking.” New York, 
Fowler and Wells, 1884, 151 pp. 
Peacock, William F. “The Smoker’s Companion, or all 
about Tobacco; Being a popularly written History of 
the Plant, etc., etc. Also a concise declaration of the 242 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 
properties of Tobacco with the unquestionable testi- 
monies of non-smokers, to its excellence and harmless- 
ness.” Manchester, John Heywood, 1867. Bragge’s 
Collection. 
Penn, W. A. “The Soverane Herbe.” London, Grant 
Richards, 1901, 326 pp. 
Physiologicus, Pilotheos. “The Way to Health, Long 
Life, and Happiness, to which is added a Treatise of 
most sorts of English Herbs, the Like never before Pub- 
lished, Communicated to the World for a general good.” 
London, Andrew Sowle, 1683. Bragge’s Collection. 
Reynolds, Thomas. “Tobacco Catechism.” London. 
Richardson, T. “The Cigar.” London, published by T. 
Richardson, 98 High Holborn: Sherwood, Jones and 
Co., Paternoster Row. W. Hunter, Edinburgh, 1825. 
Bragge’s Collection. 
Rush, Benjamin. “Observations upon the influence of the 
habitual use of Tobacco upon Health, Morals, and Prop- 
erty.” 1798. 
Schaeffer, Josia G. “Tobacco, its Immoral Tendency and 
Effects on Religion.” Washington, Ohio, 1851, 30 pp. 
Silurensis, Leolinus. “The Anatomy of Tobacco or Smok- 
ing methodized, divided, and considered after a new 
fashion.” 1884. 
Skelton, John. “Is Smoking Injurious? The Arguments 
Pro and Con, rationally considered, addressed to the 
working classes.” London, John Candwell, 1857. 
Bragge’s Collection. 
. “The Smoker’s Guide, Philosopher and Friend, what 
to smoke, what to smoke with, and the whole ‘What’s 
What’ of Tobacco, by a veteran of Smokedom.” Lon- 
don, Hardwick, 1876, 184 pp. Bragge’s Collection. 
• . “Smoking—a world of Curious Facts, Queer Fan- 
cies, and Lively Anecdotes about Pipes, Tobacco and 
Cigars.” 1891. 
Stalker, Charles. “A Treatise upon the Herb Tobacco, 
pointing out its deleterious, pernicious quality, and its 
fatal effects upon the Human Constitution, by the great 
variety of Disorders it- occasions. Not only affecting BIBLIOGRAPHY 
243 
Three of the Five Senses, to a great Degree, but im- 
pairing the Faculties of the Mind, and even frequently 
causing premature Death, by a Gentleman of the Uni- 
versity of Cambridge.” London, printed for Charles 
Stalker, 1760. Bragge’s Collection. 
Steinmetz, Andrew. “The Smoker’s Guide, Philosopher 
and Friend.” 1877, London. 
. “Tobacco, its history, cultivation, manufacture and 
adulterations.” London, 1857. 
Taylor, B. L. “The Pipesmoke Carry.” Chicago, Reilly 
and Britton, 1912. 
Tidswell, H. H. “The Tobacco Habit, its History and 
Pathology.” London, Churchill, 1912. 
Towns, Charles B. “Habits that Handicap”—The Men- 
ace of Opium, Alcohol, and Tobacco, and the remedy. 
New York, The Century Co. 
Venner, Tobias. “A Briefe and accurate treatise concern- 
ing the taking of the fume of Tobacco, which very many 
in these dayes doe too licentiously use. In which the 
immoderate, irregular, and unreasonable use thereof is 
reprehended, and the true nature and best manner of 
using it perspicuously demonstrated.” London, printed 
by W. I. for Richard Moore, 1621. Bragge’s Collec- 
tion. 
Welsh, Charles. “The Fragrant Weed, some of the good 
things that have been said or sung about tobacco.” New 
York, Dodge, 1907. 
Young, W. W. “The Story of the Cigarette.” New York, 
Appleton, 1917, 281 pp. 
II. Signed Articles in Periodicals 
Abbott, Twyman O. “The Rights of the Non-Smoker.” 
The Outlook, 94:763-7, April 2, 1910. 
Allen, William H. “A Broader Motive for School Hy- 
giene.” Atlantic Monthly, 101: 824-9, June, 1908. 
Bangs, L. Bolton, M.D. “Some Observations on the Effects 
of Tobacco in Surgical Practice.” Medical Record, 
March 14, 1908. 244 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 
Baruch, Dr. Simon, et al. “Is Tobacco Essential?” A 
symposium by Dr. Simon Baruch, Irving Fisher, Wil- 
liam White, G. Stanley Hall, Charles W. Eliot, Eugene 
Lyman Fisk, Dr. James J. Walsh. The Forum, 60: 80-7, 
June, 1918. 
Baumberger, J. P., and Martin, E. G. “Fatigue and Effi- 
ciency of Smokers in a Strenuous Mental Occupation.” 
Journal of Industrial Hygiene, Vol. II, No. 6, 207-214, 
October, 1920. 
Bell, Clark. “The Truth About Cigarettes.” Medico- 
Legal Journal Reprint. New York City, 1897-98. 
Berry, Charles Scott. “Effects of Smoking on Adding.” 
Psychological Bulletin, 14:25-8, 1917. 
Berry, Elmer. “The Physical Effect of Smoking.” Asso- 
ciation Seminar, 25: 275-308, April, 1917. 
Bloedorn, W. A. “The Barbarous Custom of Smoking.” 
Reprint from Medical Record, January 31, 1920. 
Bosworth, Francke H. “On the Use of Tobacco.” Medi- 
cal Record, March 23, 1889. 
Boult, H. Gentleman's Magazine, 50:413, 1893. 
Brooks, Harlow. “The Tobacco Heart.” Medical Journal, 
April 24, 1915. 
Burnham, William H. “The Effect of Tobacco upon 
Mental Efficiency.” Pedagogical Seminary, 24:297-317. 
Bush, Arthur Dermart. “Tobacco Smoking and Mental 
Efficiency.” New York Medical Journal, 1914. 
Carter, R. Brundenell. “Alcohol and Tobacco.” The 
Living Age, 250:479-93, August 25, 1906. 
Chesterton, Gilbert K. “The Nightmare of Dr. Saleeby.” 
The Living Age, 292:373-5, February 10, 1907. 
Clark, E. L. “The Effect of Smoking on Clark College 
Students.” Clark College Record, 4: 91-98, July, 1909. 
Daly, F. H. “Tobacco Smoking.” Gentleman’s Magazine, 
23:350, 1879. 
Davis, Helen. “The Trial of Tobacco and His Ally, King 
Alcohol.” The Union Signal, March 13, 1919. 
Davis, John M. “Idleness at the Root of the Tobacco Evil 
in Children.” Wisconsin Journal of Education, 48: 70-3, 
March, 1914. BIBLIOGRAPHY 
245 
Dickens, Charles. “To Smoke or Not to Smoke.” All the 
Year Round, May 27, 1865. 
Fairholt, F. “Tobacconalia.” Knickerbocker Magazine, 
54:528, November, 1859. 
Fisher, George. “The Case Against Smokers.” The Inde- 
pendent, 92:598, December 29, 1917. 
Gray, H. S. “The Boy and the Cigarette Habit.” Educa- 
tion, 29:294-315, January, 1909. 
Hall, Emmett C. “Why the Government Smokes Cigars.” 
Harper's Weekly, 53:12-3, November 6, 1909. 
Hamilton, Samuel. “The Physical Square Deal and the 
Cigarette Habit Among Boys.” Pennsylvania School 
Journal, 61: 398-402, March, 1913. 
Harris, D. Fraser. “Medical Aspects of the Tobacco Habit.” 
Public Health Journal, Toronto, October, 1917. 
Harrison, William. “Romance of Tobacco.” Canadian 
Magazine, 36:248-51, June, 1911. 
Henderson, John A. “What Tobacco Does to Boys.” Good 
Health, February, 1916. 
Hervey, H. D. “The Cigarette.” Journal of Education, 
65:485-7, May 2, 1907. 
Herward, Edward Vincent. “Stray Leaves from the 
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. “Use and Abuse of Smoking.” Macmillan’s, 1904, 
p. 190. 
Hirshberg, Leonard K. “Truth about Tobacco.” Harper’s 
Weekly, 56: 12-3, January 4, 1912. 
Hoffman, F. L. “The Cigarette and the Boy.” Medical 
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Hubbell, Charles Bulkley. “The Cigarette Habit.” The 
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Huber, J. B. “The Use of Tobacco by the Immature.” 
Journal of the American Medical Association, March 
2, 1901. 
Hunt, Fred A. “Smoke.” Overland Monthly, 46: 298-300, 
October, 1905. 
Hunting, J. D. “Shall Women Smoke?” The National 
Review, 1889. 
Johnson, Oscar J. “Effects of Smoking on Mental and 246 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 
Motor Efficiency.” Psychological Bulletin, 12: 132-40, 
June 15, 1918. 
Kellogg, J. H. “How Tobacco Cuts Down the Safety 
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Kent, Philip. “A Whiff of Tobacco.” Gentleman’s Mag- 
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King, Henry Churchill. “Why I am Opposed to Com- 
pulsory Smoking at Oberlin.” Ohio Educational 
Monthly, 67: 264-7, July, 1918. 
Kress, Lauretta E. “Tobacco Using among Women.” 
Life and Health, July, 1913. 
Landar, Sir Lander Brunton. “The Effect of Tobacco in 
Health and Disease.” Medical Examiner and Practi- 
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Landgraff, G. H. “Statistics Regarding Cigarette Smok- 
ing Among Grade Boys.” IVisconsin Journal of Educar 
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Lichty, J. “Another Cause of Railway Wrecks.” The 
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Manuel, Herschel T. “Is the College Smoker a Worthy 
Social Institution?” School and Society, 4: 699-705, 
November 4, 1916. 
Mardis, S. K. “An Investigation of the Tobacco Habit 
Among School Boys.” Ohio Teacher, 21: 315-6, July, 
1901. 
McKeever, William A. “The Cigarette Boy.” Education, 
28: 154-60, November, 1907. 
. “Warfare on Cigarettes.” Journal of Education, 
81: 433, April 22, 1915. 
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March 9, 1907. 
Meylan, George L. “Effects of Smoking on College Stu- 
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1910. 
Nalpasse, Valentine. “How Much, if any, Should We 
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Nutt, Hubert W. “Do We Need New Ideals?” Teacher’s 
Journal, 14:364-8, March, 1915- BIBLIOGRAPHY 
247 
Ogg, R. A. “Public Schools and the Cigarette.” Educator- 
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Pack, Frederick J. “Smoking and Football Men.” Popular 
Science Monthly, October, 1912. 
Pomeroy, H. Sterling. “The Boy and the Cigarette.” 
Health Education Series No. 7, Health Education 
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Quick, Richard. “The Antiquity of the Tobacco Pipe.” 
The Antiquary, 42: 20. 
Redman, Elmer S. “What Cigarettes Do to a Boy.” Edu- 
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Rush, Arthur Durmont. Journal of Education, March 17, 
1914. 
. New York Medical Journal, 99: 519-27, 1914. 
Sandwick, Richard L. “The Use of Tobacco as a Cause 
of Failures and Withdrawals in One High School.” 
Moderator—Topics, 33:688-9, May 8, 1913. 
. “Tobacco and Student Mortality.” Journal of Edu- 
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Seaver, Jay W. “The Effects of Nicotine.” The Arena, 
17: 470, February, 1897. 
Shank, Ethel J. “Has the Law Concerning Stimulants and 
Narcotics Been Obeyed?” Iowa State Teachers’ Asso- 
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Shaw, Len G. “The Way of the Transgressor.” Journal 
of Education, 81: 212-3, February 25, 1915. 
Showerman, Grant. “Smith, Smoke and the War.” The 
New Republic, 14: 109-10, February 23, 1918. 
Simonton, Thomas Grier. “School Houses and School 
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Pennsylvania School Journal, 13: 588-92, May, 1910. 
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American School Hygiene Association Proceedings, 
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Stevens, A. M. “Tobacco and Drama.” Gentleman’s Mag- 
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Stewart, Sylvester. “What Everybody Ought to Know 
About Tobacco.” Education, 32: 485-8, August, 1912. 248 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 
Stilles, C. H. Wardell and Altman, S. B. “Snuff and 
Tobacco: Their Use by School Boys and Girls in County 
Z.” Reprint No. 118 from Public Health Reports, Feb- 
ruary 28, 1913. 
Stoddard, Cora Frances. “Smoking as a Handicap to Col- 
lege Students.” Journal of Education, 74: 41-2, July 6, 
1911. 
Taylor, Charles Keen. “The Boy and the Cigarette.” 
Psychological Clinic, 4: 54-5, April 15, 1910. 
Thorardsen, Franklin. “The Tobacco Habit Among Pu- 
pils. Is There a Remedy?” North Dakota Educational 
Association Proceedings, 1909, 197-201. 
Tolstoi, Leo. “The Ethics of Wine Drinking and Tobacco 
Smoking.” Contemporary Review, 59: 170, 1891. 
Towns, Charles B. “The Injury of Tobacco and Its Rela- 
tion to Other Drug Habits.” The Century Magazine, 
83: 766-72, March, 1912. 
Van Geist, Peter. “Experiences of a Cigarette Smoker.” 
Knickerbocker Magazine, 24: 307, October, 1844. 
Waldo, K. D. “Tobacco Statistics at Sycamore, Illinois, 
High School.” School News, 24: 199, January, 1911. 
Walsh, F. C. “Truth about Tobacco.” Technical World, 
21: 180-5, April, 1914. 
Ward, Paul G. “Figures on Cigarette Boys.” Western 
Journal of Education, 15: 64-5, February, 1910. 
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January 25, 1912. 
Werner, Carl. “The Tobacco Comedy.” Harper’s Weekly, 
53: 12-3, June 5, 1909. 
White, R. L. “The Effects of the Habitual Use of Tobacco.” 
Southern Medical Journal, January, 1915. 
Whitney, E. R. “Tobacco’s Effect on High-School Pupils.” 
American Educational Review, 11: 382, April, 1908. 
Wilcox, Ella Wheeler. “The Woman Who Smokes.” 
New York Evening Journal, March 30, 1911. 
Wiley, Harvey W. “Little White Slaver.” Good House- 
keeping, 62: 91-5, January, 1916. 
Williams, J. C. “Narcotic Teachers Teaching Narcotics.” 
Texas School Journal, 33: 13-4, January, 1916. BIBLIOGRAPHY 
249 
Woods, Matthew. “Some of the Minor Immoralities of the 
Tobacco Habit.” Journal of the American Medical 
Association, April 1, 1899. 
III. Unsigned Articles 
American Educational Review, 35: 536-7, September, 1914. 
“Cigarettes and Education.” Gives statistics of smoking 
among college students. 
Atlantic Monthly, 8:696, December, 1861. “A New Coun- 
terblaste.” 
, 100: 143-4, June, 1907. In the Contributor's Club— 
“A Degenerate.” 
, 117:573-5, April, 1916. In the Contributor’s Club— 
“Smoking.” 
The Bellman, 24:315-6, March 23, 1918. “The Soldier and 
Tobacco.” 
The Bookman, 21:467-71, June, 1905. “Literature and To- 
bacco.” 
British Medical Journal, April 10, 1909. “The Percentage of 
Nicotine in Various Kinds of Tobacco.” 
, February 19, 1910. “Excessive Smoking and Gastric 
Secretion.” 
Chambers’ Journal, 1845. “The Most Popular Plant in the 
World.” 
, 76: 55. “Cigarettes and Cigarette Making.” 
, 78: 30. “Confessions of a Cigarette Smoker.” 
Current Literature, 43:217, August, 1907. “Tobacco as the 
Great Producer of Degenerates.” 
, 46:331, March, 1909. “Effect of Tobacco Smoke on 
Animals.” 
Dietetic and Hygienic Gazette, May, 1914- “Save the Boy.” 
Good Health, May, 1918. “The Cigarette Epidemic”; “To- 
bacco Poisons”; “Deadly Effects of Tobacco on Plants 
and Animals”; “Effects of Tobacco Upon Athletes”; 
“Eminent Authorities who Condemn Tobacco”; “Mul- 
doon Opposes Tobacco Smoking”; “Diseases Caused by 
Tobacco.” 250 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 
Harper’s Weekly, 54:16-7, December 3, 1910. “Cigars and 
the Women.” 
, 56:24, August 3, 1912. “Harmless Smoking.” 
The Independent, 64: 1306, June 4, 1908. “Smoke Consump- 
tion.” 
, 84:231, November 8, 1915. “A City’s War against 
Cigarettes.” 
, 98:50, April 12, 1919. “Shall Tobacco Follow Alco- 
hol ?” 
Journal of American Medical Association, June 30, 1909. 
“The Pharmacology of Tobacco Smoke.” 
, April 2, 1910. “Increase of Smoking and its Effects 
on Youth.” s 
, November 20, 1915. “Tobacco and the Heart.” 
, December 27, 1913. “Amnesias of Tobacco and of 
Malarial Origin.” 
, May 8, 1909. “Tobacco.” 
, September 16, 1905. “Effects of Tobacco in Health 
and Disease.” 
, October 1, 1910. “Effects of Tobacco on Body and 
Mind.” 
, March 15, 1920. “Tobacco Smokers Classified.” 
Journal of Education, 77:177, February 13, 1913. “Anti- 
Cigarette Brigade.” 
, 80:659, December 31, 1914. “Cigarette Cure.” 
, 81: 707, June 24, 1915. “Cigarette Law of Ken- 
tucky.” 
Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, March 15, 1920. 
“Tobacco Smokers Classified.” 
Knickerbocker Magazine, 61: 143, February, 1863. “Aid, 
Comfort, and Counsel to Smokers.” 
Literary Digest, 49:238, August 8, 1914. “Some Cigarette 
Figures.” 
Lancet, 1912. “The Toxic Factor in Tobacco.” 
, 52:560-1, March 4, 1916. “An Easy Habit to 
Drop.” 
, 58:32, August 10, 1918. “Tobacco and Pugilism in 
the Army.” BIBLIOGRAPHY 
251 
Lancet, 60: 19-20, March 15, 1919. “Must Lady Nicotine 
Follow John Barleycorn?” 
, 61: 76, June 28, 1919. “Women War Workers Fight 
for Privileges, Including Smoking.” 
, 62:112-4, August 30, 1919. “The Poison in the 
Pipe.” 
, 63: 27-8, November 1, 1919. “Breeding Out the 
Nicotine.” 
Macmillan’s, 1896, 289. “On the Antiquity of Tobacco Smok- 
ing.” 
Medical Record, June 28, 1913. “The Use of Snuff and 
Tobacco by School Children.” 
, July 12, 1913. “The Habit of Smoking in its Rela- 
tion to the Insurance Examiner.” 
, August 4, 1906. “Cigarette Smoking in Great 
Britain.” 
, July 18, 1914. “Immoderate Smoking and the 
Cardiovascular System.” 
, September 2, 1916. “The Tobacco Habits of School 
Children.” 
Missouri School Journal, 32:243-6, June, 1915. “The 
Deadly Cigarette in Kentucky.” 
Nashville Journal of Medicine and Surgery, June, 1916. 
“The Poisons in Tobacco Smoke.” 
New York Medical Journal, July 25, 1914. “The Luckless 
Cigarette.” 
New York Sun, September 20, 1916. “Effects of Tobacco on 
the Health of Smokers.” 
, September 21, 1917. “New Light on the Cigarette 
and Its Influence on Health.” 
The Outlook, 79:611-2, March 11, 1905. “A Foolish Piece 
of Legislation.” 
Pennsylvania School Journal, 62:314, January, 1914. “The 
Boy and the Cj^rette.” 
Pittsburgh School Bulletin, 3 : 4-5, September, 1909. “Smok- 
ers Among Sixth Grade Boys.” 
Progress of the Medical Sciences, July, 1879. “Tobacco 
Blindness.” 252 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 
Psychological Clinic, 7: 153-60, November 15, 1913. “A Lit- 
tle More Truth about Tobacco.” 
Review of Reviews, 32: 226-7, August, 1905. “Paid Readers 
in Cuban Cigar Factories.” 
Rural Educator, 5:175, October, 1915. “School Boys Pro- 
tected from Cigarettes in Oklahoma.” 
The Sanitary Era, July 1, 1888. “The Process of Tobacco 
Poisoning.” 
Saturday Review, 94:484, 1902. “Babies and Cigarettes.” 
Scribner’s Magazine, 62:253-4, August, 1917. In “Point of 
View,” “My Lord Nicotine.” 
The Survey, 37:494, January 27, 1917. “Kansas Off on 
Another Crusade.” 
The Unpopular Review, 8: 213-4, July, 1917. “On Smoking.” 
West Virginia School Journal, 39:43, September, 1910. 
“The Use of Tobacco by School Children.” 
Wisconsin Journal of Education, 49: 154-6, June, 1917. “Is 
the Cigarette Harmful?” INDEX 
Academic Status, of smokers vs. non-smokers in schools, 137. 
Addition, method of studying effect of tobacco on speed in, 209; 
table showing net effect on speed in addition, 210. 
Alcohol, suggestions from study of, 176. 
Alertness, effect of tobacco on, 227. 
Ambition, effect of tobacco on, 228. 
Artists, testimonies of, 73-82. 
Bain, views on tobacco, 3. 
Bascom, views on tobacco, 12. 
Baumberger and Martin, investigation by, 131. 
Beaumont, views on tobacco, 5. 
Berry, investigation by, 172-173. 
Biography, data derived from, 3-98; verdict of, 99-115. 
Bodine, views on tobacco, 9. 
Bush, investigation by, 130, 170-172. 
Cabinet officers, testimonies of, 82-84. 
Caffeine, suggestions from study of, 176. 
Cancellation tests, 201-203; table showing net effect of tobacco on 
mental activity involved in cancellation test, 204; table showing 
net effect on accuracy in cancellation test, 205. 
Captains of Industry, testimonies of, 90-94. 
Cartwright, views on tobacco, 5. 
Chart, showing curve of 70,000 school standings, 153; showing 
curve of standings of boys who smoke equivalent of five pipes 
per week, 158; of ten pipes per week, 159. 
Clark, investigation by, 128. 
Conflicting opinions, 3-15; Bain, 3; Fielding, 4; Lamb, 4; Kings- 
ley, 5; Beaumont and Fletcher, 5; Cartwright, 5; Schaeffer, 5; 
Van Geist, 6; Taylor, 7; Walsh, 7; Howells, 8; Holmes, 8; 
Cowper, 8; Towns, 9; Hubbard, 9; Tolstoy, 9; Sandeau, 11; 
Lilly, 12; Bascom, 12; Superintendents, Principals, and Teach- 
ers, 13; University instructors, 14; Magazine articles, 15. 
Congressmen, testimonies of, 82-84. 
Control and Tobacco Smokes, manner of alternation of, 183-184. 
Correlation, between tobacco and scholarship, 155-157. 
Cowper, views on tobacco, 8. 
Cox, investigation by, 123-124. 
253 254 
INDEX 
Creative Ability, effect of tobacco on, 224-225. 
Critique of Testimonies, 109-115. 
Davis, investigation by, 121. 
Dimmitt, investigation by, 125-127. 
Diplomats, testimonies of, 82-84. 
Disturbing Factors, control of in the investigation of tobacco, 
177-186; problem to be solved, 177; method of conducting 
laboratory work, 178; Hull’s device for controlling disturbing 
factors, 179-181; introspection by subjects showing control of 
suggestion, etc., 182-183; manner of alternating tobacco and 
control smokes, 183-184. 
Engineers, testimonies of, 94-98. 
Fatigue, muscular, method of studying effect of tobacco on, 
199; table showing net effect on, 200. 
Fielding, views on tobacco, 4. 
Financiers, testimonies of, 90-94. 
Fink, study of S. A. T. C. men, 100-103. 
Fletcher, views on tobacco, 5. 
Gosling, investigation by, 124-125. 
Hervey, investigation by, 119-121. 
Holmes, views on tobacco, 8. 
Holt, investigation by, 132-133. 
How'ells, views on tobacco, 8. 
Hubbard, views on tobacco, 9. 
Hull, device for controlling disturbing factors, 179-181. 
Hygienists, testimonies of, 42-51. 
Individual Pupils, effect of tobacco on, 138-146. 
Intellectual Processes, effect of tobacco on, 201-219; cancellation 
tests Forms A, B, and C, 201-203; table showing net effect of 
tobacco on mental activity involved in cancellation test, 204; 
table showing net effect of tobacco on accuracy in cancellation 
test, 205; method of studying effect on memory, 205-206; 
table showing net effect of tobacco on memory span for digits, 
208; method of studying effect on speed in addition, 208-209; 
table showing net effect on speed in addition, 209; table show- 
ing net effect on accuracy in performing addition, 210; method 
of studying effect on complex perceptive and reactive processes, 
212-213; table showing net effect on reading reaction time, 214; 
method of studying effect on learning, 215-217; table showing 
net effect on facility in learning, 218. 
Intelligence Tests, results of on smokers and non-smokers, 153- 
154. INDEX 
255 
Interviews, testimony derived from, 99-100. 
Irritability, effect of tobacco on, 228. 
Introspection, data derived from, 3-98; verdict of, 99-115. 
Johnson, laboratory investigation by, 168-170. 
Johnston, investigation by, 173-174. 
Judges and Lawyers, testimonies of, 85-90. 
Judgment, effect of tobacco on, 226-227. 
Kingsley, views on tobacco, 5. 
Laboratory Investigation, problems in, 163-176; necessary to se- 
cure accuracy, 163-167; relation of school records to laboratory 
data, 165-166; relation of personal testimony to laboratory 
data, 166-167; laboratory investigation by Johnson, 168-170; 
investigation by Bush, 170-172; investigation by Berry, 172-173; 
investigation by Johnston, 173-174; disturbing factors in in- 
vestigations by Johnson, Bush, Berry, Johnston, 175-176; 
Rivers on difficulty of controlling disturbing factors, 176; sug- 
gestions from the study of alcohol and caffeine, 176. 
Laboratory Work, method of, 178. 
Lamb, views on tobacco, 4. 
Learning, method of studying effect of tobacco on, 215-217; 
table showing net effect on facility in, 218. 
Lilly, views on tobacco, 12. 
Literary men, testimonies of, 73-82. 
Lord, investigation by, 122. 
Mature Individuals, effect of tobacco on, 230-231; testimony of 
regarding effect of tobacco on immature pupils, 234. 
McKeever, investigation by, 128. 
Meditation, effect of tobacco on, 223-224. 
Memory, method of studying effect of tobacco on, 205-206; table 
showing net effect on span for digits, 208. 
Method, of investigating effects of tobacco on scholarship of 
pupils, 149-151. 
Meylan, investigation by, 129. 
Military and Naval Officers, testimonies of, 94-98. 
Motor Processes, as effected by tobacco (see Physiological and 
Motor Processes). 
Musicians, testimonies of, 73-82. 
Native Ability, smokers compared with non-smokers, 233. 
Non-smokers, Apperson’s list of, 34; Lander’s list, 34. 
Observation, data derived from, 3-98; verdict of, 99-115. 256 
INDEX 
Pack, investigation by, 129-130. 
Percentage of Smokers, in schools, 136-137. 
Perceptive and Reactive Processes, method of studying effect of 
tobacco on, 212-213; table showing net effect on reading reac- 
tion time, 214. 
Personnel Directors, testimony of, 107-108. 
Physical Educationists, testimonies of, 42-51. 
Physicians, testimonies of, 42-51. 
Physiological and Motor Processes, as effected by tobacco, 185- 
200; testimony of physicians regarding effect of tobacco on 
pulse beat, 185; relation of rapidity and steadiness of and 
endurance in motor activity to intellectual activity, 186; tables 
showing effect of tobacco on rate of pulse beat, 187-191; in- 
terpretation of tables, 192-194; tables showing net effect on 
rate of pulse beat, 195; method of studying effect of tobacco 
on tremor, 196; table showing net effect on steadiness of mus- 
cular control, 197; method of studying effect of tobacco on 
rate of tapping, 197; table showing net effect on rate of tap- 
ping, 198; method of studying effect on muscular fatigue, 199; 
table showing net effect on muscular fatigue, 200. 
Plot, of 70,000 school records, 151-153. 
Presidents, testimonies of, 82-84. 
Principals and Faculties of High Schools, testimony of, 134-148; 
questionnaire employed in investigation, 135; percentage of 
smokers in schools, 136-137; academic status of smokers vs. 
non-smokers in schools, 137; description of effect of tobacco 
on individual pupils, 138-146. 
Prominent Persons of the Past, habits of respecting use of to- 
bacco, 16-34; Miss Stafford’s investigation, 16; Roe’s investi- 
gation, 17; Lincoln, Greeley, Phillips, Garrison, Beecher, Whit- 
tier, non-smokers, 17; Washington, Gambetta, smokers, 17; 
Bismarck, smoker, 19; William, King of Prussia, Mazzini, 
Italian statesman, smokers, 20; Robespierre, Danton, non- 
smokers, 20; Washington, smoker, 20; Lincoln, Roosevelt, 
Gladstone, non-smokers, 21; Grant, Beaconsfield, Frederick the 
Great, Dr. Johnson, Napoleon, Talleyrand, Metternich, Gibbon, 
Robert Burns, Raleigh, Kitchener, “Chinese” Gordon, users of 
tobacco, 20; Wellington, non-smoker, 20; Paley, Hobbs, 
Fletcher, Spurgeon, smokers, 22-23; Burnett, Dean Aldrich, 
Huxley, Darwin, Newton, Porson, smokers, 24-25; Dumas, 
Victor Hugo, Balzac, Goethe, Heine, non-smokers, 25; Zola, 
non-smoker, 26; list of English writers who were smokers, 27; 
Ruskin, opposed to tobacco, 27; Emerson, Carlyle, Dickens, 
Thackeray, Tennyson, smokers, 29-31; Stevenson, Hawthorne, 
Mark Twain, smokers, 32; Holmes, against tobacco, 32-33; 
testimony of Roosevelt’s physicians, 33; Apperson’s list of 
prominent non-smokers, 34; Lander’s list, 34. 
Psychologists, testimonies of, 57-64. INDEX 
257 
Psychological Laboratory, data derived from, 163-219; problems 
in laboratory investigation, 163-176; control of disturbing fac- 
tors in the investigation of tobacco, 177-186; the effect of 
tobacco on certain physiological and motor processes, 185-200; 
effect on intellectual processes, 201-219. 
Pulse Beat, testimony of physicians regarding effect of tobacco 
on, 185; relation of rapidity and steadiness of and endurance 
in motor activity to intellectual activity, 186; tables showing 
effect of tobacco on rate of pulse beat, 187-191; interpretation 
of tables, 192-194; table showing net effect on rate of pulse 
beat, 195. 
Questionnaire, employed in investigation, 135. 
Reports of Investigators, of the role of tobacco in high school 
and college, 119-133; Hervey, 119-121; Davis, 121; Lord, 122; 
Smith, 122-123; Cox, 123-124; Sandwick, 124; Gosling, 124- 
125; Dimmitt, 125-127; McKeever, 128; Clark, 128; Meylan, 
129; Pack 129-130; Seaver, 130; Bush, 130; Baumberger and 
Martin, 131; Holt, 132-133. 
Rivers, views on difficulty of controlling disturbing factors, 176. 
Sandeau, views on tobacco, 11. 
Sandwick, investigation by, 124. 
S. A. T. C. Men, at Syracuse University, 100; at Miami Univer- 
sity, 100-103. 
Schaeffer, views on tobacco, 5, 13. 
School and College Records, data derived from, 119-159; reports 
,of various investigators, 119-133; testimony of principals and 
faculties of high schools, 134-148; school records, 149-159. 
School Records, verdict of, 149-159; method of investigation, 
149-151; plot of 70,000 school records, 151-153; results of 
intelligence tests on smokers and non-smokers, 153-154; corre- 
lation between tobacco and scholarship, 155-157; charts show- 
ing effect of tobacco on scholarship of boys, 158-159. 
Scientists, physical and biological, testimonies of, 64-72. 
Seaver, investigation by, 130. 
Smith, investigation by, 122-123. 
Soldiers, effect of tobacco on, 103-106. 
Subjects, introspection of, 182-183. 
Superintendents, Principals, and Teachers, views on tobacco, 13. 
Tables, showing effect of tobacco on rate of pulse beat, 187-191, 
195; on steadiness c muscular control, 197; on rate of tapping, 
198; on muscular fatigue, 200; on mental activity involved in 
cancellation test, 204; on accuracy in cancellation test, 205; 
on memory, 208; on accuracy in addition, 210; on speed in 
addition, 210; on reading reaction time, 214; on facility in 
learning, 218; on every subject in respect to every intellectual 
activity studied, 222. 258 
INDEX 
Tapping, method of studying effect of tobacco on rate of, 197; 
table showing net effect on, 198. 
Taylor, views on tobacco, 7. 
Testimonies of Men and Women of Distinction, 35-98; physi- 
cians, hygienists, physical educationists, 42-51; university presi- 
dents and deans, 51-57; psychologists, 57-64; scientists, physical 
and biological, 64-72; literary men, artists, musicians, 73-82; 
presidents, congressmen, cabinet officers, and diplomats, 82-84; 
judges and lawyers, 85-90; financiers, captains of industry, 90- 
94; military and naval officers and engineers, 94-98. 
Tobacco and Mental Efficiency, 220-235; variability in effects on 
any one individual from day to day, 220; variability in respect 
to different intellectual processes, 220; variability among indi- 
viduals, 220-221; variability according to time elapsing between 
smoking and intellectual performance, 221; table showing net 
effect in case of every subject in respect to every intellectual 
activity studied, 222; effect of tobacco on meditation, 223-224; 
on creative ability, 224-225; on judgment, 226-227; on alert- 
ness, 227; on ambition, 228; on irritability, 228; on vitality, 
229; conclusions respecting effect on mature individuals, 230- 
231; effect on high-school pupils, 231-232; on habits of intel- 
lectual lassitude, 232; as revealed in biographical reports, 232; 
native ability of smokers as compared with non-smokers, 233; 
effect of on extra-school activities, 233; on college and uni- 
versity students, 234; testimony of mature persons regarding 
effect on immature pupils, 234; control of use of tobacco by 
high-school pupils, 235. 
Towns, views on tobacco, 9. 
Tremor, method of studying effect of tobacco on, 196; table 
showing net effect of tobacco on, 197. 
University Deans, testimonies of, 51-57. 
University Instructors, views on tobacco, 14. 
University Presidents, testimonies of, 51-57. 
Van Geist, views on tobacco, 6. 
Verdict regarding Tobacco, of observation, introspection, biog- 
raphy, 99-115; testimony derived from interviews, 99-100; 
Fink’s study of S. A. T. C. men, 100-103; testimony of 
S. A. T. C. men at Syracuse University, 100; effect of tobacco 
on soldiers, 103-106; testimony of directors of personnel in in- 
dustrial organizations, 107-108; critique of testimonies of per- 
sons of distinction, 109-115; literary men and artists who 
achieved distinction without tobacco, 113; verdict of school 
records, 149-159; conclusions, 220-235. 
Vitality, effect of tobacco on, 229. 
Walsh, views on tobacco, 7.