EFFECT OF MENTAL AND EMOTIONAL STATES ON THE LEUKOCYTE COUNT

Abstract

It is known that mental and emotional states may produce changes in pulse rate, blood pressure, respiratory rate and pupillary reactions, but no attempt has ever been made to study and record leukocytic changes, as far as we have been able to determine from a careful survey of the literature. It has been noted by some that increased leukocyte counts may be found following epileptic attacks and hysterical seizures, but we are not aware that accurate studies have been made in these conditions. It has been our purpose in these experiments to determine the effects of mental and emotional states on the number and types of leukocytes in the peripheral blood of animals and man. With this end in view, we used dogs in our first series of experiments. Our methods of inducing alterations in the emotional states of the animals consisted of such procedures as placing a cat or