Smoking worsens memory, scientists have proved
Last reviewed: 23.04.2024
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Scientists from the UK (University of Northumbria) conducted a study that proves that smoking worsens a person's memory.
The study involved 27 smokers, 18 quit smoking and 24 non-smokers. First, the participants held memory tests: they had to remember certain things in certain places. For example, in what building of the university did the musical group play.
During the study, factors such as the difference in the mood of participants, their IQs were taken into account. The experiment was not attended by people who abused alcohol or those who took it recently.
Project manager Tom Heffernan said that smokers coped poorly with the test, remembering only about 59% of the initial information. People who quit smoking were able to restore 74% of information in memory, and non-smoking people - 81%.
This study was the first to study the effect of smoking on the state of human memory. Scientists consider it important that smoking affects the cognitive functions of the brain, since in the UK the number of smokers has increased to 10 million, and in the United States - 45 million.
Now Tom Heffernan and his colleagues are preparing to study the effect of secondhand smoke on the state of memory and everyday life of a person.
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