Smokers' Brain- What Researches Say?

Think about the greatest scientist ever, Albert Einstein. Think about the person with more than 1300 patents in his name, Thomas Alva Edison. Think about famous American astronomer, Edwin Hubble; the inventor of telephone, Alexander Graham Bell; the founder of Psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud. Can you tell the similarity between all these brilliant heads? Let me help you, all of them were smokers, in fact all of them had an addiction to it. Who might forget the famous picture of Albert Einstein with his inseparable pipe and his saying “Smoking Helps Me Clear My Mind”.(Read More)

Thinking of powerful men and cigars, there are a lot of names in the world history. Many presidents of the United States of America have been known to smoke. Franklin D Roosevelt, the 32^nd president of the US, the man who was elected to an unprecedented four terms, the one who is known for works of social and economic development in the country and one of the leading hands of the United Nations, was a smoker. Right from the first president, George Washington to John F Kennedy and to Barack Hussein Obama, none of them have succeeded to stay away from cigars.

J K Rowling wrote the famous Harry Potter Series as a smoker. After she quit smoking she became a chewing gum addict.

If we look into the fictional characters as well, the famous detective from Scotland, Sherlock Holmes; the super strong spinach eating sailor man, Popeye, all are shown as smokers. Do you really have to be a smoker to be as strong as Popeye or as brilliant head as Holmes? Well, the history shows that way, at least. But is it scientifically proved? Does smoking really increase memory power?

People smoke to refresh after spending hours in their work. They say they feel relaxed and refreshed when they smoke. This property of nicotine, that they claim, make them addicted to cigarettes.

There are huge number of researches conducted to investigate the truth about smoking and every another research produces a different conclusion.

Some researchers working on the field say smoking can really boost memory power and concentration. A research done on rats at the Institute of Psychiatry Kings College, London revealed that nicotine can improve the performance in rats. An idea of nicotine pill, with lesser side effects, has been proposed as a treatment to the Alzheimer's Disease.

Another research conducted at the University of Michigan revealed that besides giving us all the problems that we can imagine, including cancer and heart diseases, excessive smoking causes memory impairments and loss of creativity. The impairments were more pronounced among the people smoking more than 20 cigarettes a day. Long time smokers were found to have a significant memory loss at the age of 40-50. There also remains the probability of brain damage, due to the chemicals in the cigarettes, among those classes of people. The research also concluded that the impairments to our memory due to smoking are just like that of the alcohols.

The researchers also suggest that a good 8 hours of sleep can increase concentration and memory to a greater extent that smoking a cigarette does.

I suggest, if you are a smoker, reduce you intake so that cancers will have a long way to come to you and if you are a non-smoker, take a good rest to boost your memory.