Smoker's are dumb!

I've always thought that smokers are dumb. Apparently, now it's official. Or at least according to this study.

Excerpt:

Researchers from the Universities of Aberdeen and Edinburgh looked at how the cognitive abilities of smokers and non-smokers changed over time.

They found smokers performed significantly worse in five separate tests. [...]

It would appear that the well-worn cliché that 'smoking stunts your growth' may be true when it comes to intellectual development Amanda Sandford, Action on Smoking and Health. [...]

Current or former smokers were found to perform less well in the tests even after factors such as childhood IQ, education, occupation and alcohol consumption were taken into account.

The effect appeared to be stronger in current smokers according to the study, which was also published in the journal Addictive Behaviors. The researchers suggest a "small but significant" negative effect of 4% linked to the combined effects of smoking and impaired lung function - itself linked to smoking.

It has been suggested in previous studies that there could be a link between impaired lung function and a negative effect on the thinking processes, but it is not clear what the mechanism for that might be.

Dr Lawrence Whalley of the University of Aberdeen, who led the research, said the explanation could be that smoking causes oxidative stress - cumulative damage caused by molecules called "free radicals" - to organs including the brain.

"Ageing neurons are very sensitive to oxidative damage."