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Feel Good
Why You Have That Lazy,
Contented Feeling After a Good
Meal; Why We Love to Bask in th
Warm Summer Sunshine; Why
Dancing Makes Us Happy; What
Makes Us Uncomfortable
on Hot Days and Why Everybody
Hates Humid, Sticky Weather
v I good,” and those who do
not certainly know what It means
o “feel bad.” Few people, however, have
iny definite idea of the exact causes that
We know,
produce these states of feeling.
'for Instance, that a pleasant breeze on a
moderately warm day is likely to make us
feel good. We know that a good dinner
properly digested -has a similar efTect. But
the exact paths by which this feeling is
spread ail through our organism is a mys
tery to most people.
Professor George V. N. Dearborn of the
Tufts College Medical and Dental Schools,
Boston, and the Sargent Normal School,
Cambridge, has made a most ingenious at
tempt to explain scientifically what it is
that makes us "feel good” and also, to
some extent, what makes us “feel bad.”
Among his conclusions he finds that the
4.000,000 villi of the intestine, little tufts,
rich in smooth muscle and sympathetic
nerves, adapt the nutritive fats and pro
teins of the blood to the immediate needs
of the nerve cells and may, besides, send
sympathetic influences which, fusing in
the brain, make us “feel good" or gen
erally happy.
“Euphoria” is the pretty scientific wor<^
that he uses for the condition of feeling
generally well and happy. “Dysphoria” is
the corresponding word for feeling bad.
This scientist finds that three classes
of factors principally make up the condi
tion of “Euphoria": (A) Nutritional and
sympathetic Influences from the active in
testinal villi; (B) Kinesthesia, or the sense
of movement, and (C) the eplcritic im
pulses or the impulses which flow from
sensations felt in the skin.
The nutritional influences toward good
humor or feeling good go to the neurons,
or nervous units, and especially to those
In the gray layer of the brain and trunk
nerves through the blood streams from the
liver and digestive centres. The sympa
thetic impulses that also contribute to
feeling good are certain nerve currents
which experimental physiology and the
Investigator’s personal experience both
suggest to be in operation. These im
pulses from the intestines have muc^h to
do with the determination of moods and
passions and temperaments.
Professor Dearborn says that under
normal cdnditions there is a direct rela
tionship between absorption of food from
the small intestines and the general state
of the mind. This is why acute fatigue is
so immediately relieved by a glass of hot
milk or malted milk or some variety of
soup This profound physiological truth
also explains why the worried man on
coming home from the office feels hiB
worries slip away so very quickly after
dinner. There is a "direct nutritive stimu
lation" of the central, and especially the
cortical, nerve centres.
“It is not a traditional delusion,” says
Professor Dearborn, "that fat men and
boys are usually good natured, and lean
women cuttingly keen and not, obviously,
too happy. On the one hand, the Eskimos,
and on the other hand, the races of South
ern Europe, both eaters of much fat, cer
tainly have a higher euphorio index than
the Scotchman, for example, or the thin,
down-wast Yankee.
A comfortable condition of the nerve
cells Is dependent on the supply of "Nlssl’s
granules,” a complex substance com
pounded of fat and protein, in which tha
characteristic determinant is what, the
biologists term a lipoid, a fatlike material,
or phosphorized fat. Experiments have
(Shown that there is a very quick loss of
jthis material in the nerve cells when the
|bss of material by the body exceeds the
intake. In addition to these Important
bodies the sheath of the principal nerves
Is a fatty substance, very liable to suffer
from the same causes.
The minute nerve cells are in imme
diate and constant relation with the blood
Itre^m, A blood corpuscle pass§6 entirely
through the circulation in about thirty sec
onds. The unification of nerve cell nutri
tion and blood from the intestine is sur
prisingly complete and rapid. An increase
in the fat, content taken up by the intes
tine is almost immediately used in the
lining of the brain and trunk nerves, rais
ing the tone of the nerve cells to a bet
ter condition.
influences, from as many receptors in the
joints, muscles, tendons, skin and bones,
are continually pouring into our centres
of consciousness.
“These,” says Professor Dearborn, “rep
resent in the ultimate analysis the environ
ment to the personality within and more
specifically integrate the body and the
mind, furnishing to the psvchomotor cen
The Physical Mechanism of Happiness.
'A Very Important Group of
Factors to Happiness Arises
from Movements, Such as
Classical Dancing or Doing
Some Skilful Work.”
Madame Karsavina Here
Illustrates the Kind of
Dancing That Helps
Happiness.
Other sense organs, those of oxtflattoif
or evaporation, of tickle and of touch, are
In a like manner "tunable" to outside con
ditions.
Gentle friction of the skin fa also con*
duoive to feeling well. Every known ani
mal of sufficient evolutionary develop
ment act® as if it enjoyed gentle massage
of the skin. Baths of suitable temperature
have a most important influence in mak
ing us feel well because of the gentle
stimulation of the skin, which is imme
diately felt by the deep-seated nervous
receptors.
Two functions of the skin which spread
a feeling of well-being through the system
are evaporation and oxidation. The evap
oration of the sweat poured out in the epi
dermis is the chief means of the regula
tion of temperature. The average daily
amount is about 1,500 cubic centimeters
(about 1,500 thimblefuls), but a group of
glassmakers observed by Dr. McElroy had
an average secretion of 25,000 cubic cen
timeters in the course of a nine-hour day.
Occasionally the production stopped,
whereupon the man would become ill, have
to cease work and would be revived by
the active efforts of his fellow workers.
This shows that the sweating function is
closely allied with feeling well. Ba’-trr
and muggy weather shows us the same
thing unless free evaporation corrects it
Students In a Summer school may enjoy
a feeling of "Euphoria" with vigorous ex
ercise when the gymnasium temperature
is in the 90’s. i
The mystprloua highly euphoric stimulT
tion of a gale of wind, when not Outs!/
the favora’ le range of temperature, as*
Nova Scotia in September, is well kn\J™
to dootors, and this Implies that /°**
friction, friction in the ordinary Ph# 1 ,
sense of the term, may be also a factor vl
making us “feel good.” "Massage and th®
caress seem to possibly imply enme
thing,” conynenta Ffofeaspi pej/rtiorn
well-nigh Indispensable element of feel
ing well is stimulation of the skin in the
way natural to It. Just as a Spring wind
bowing over a rich, natural meadow be
neficially Influences all the different kinds
of herbage at once, to the general en
richment of the field, so a proper stimula
tion of the skin influences the whole hu
man organism,
4—Fatty glob- | s — Fatty
i.le <E), which | B , obnIe (E)
has been «x- I
traotefl from the | P * ■ • 1 ® *
food particle by i through th*
th* lymph cor- mala
puaele. passing i y m „ h atlc
through the lit- J
tie duct to the i dnct ‘° lh *
Irmphatio ays. ! a u b claviaa
tem. j Tdn (V),
tres their only data by which the body
may be co-ordinated.”
The muscles of our body have always,
even in the deepest slumber, some “tonus"
and are sending, together with their
mechanical fellow tissues, floods of en
ergy Into the central nervous system. This
is why physical activity makes happi
ness and creates mental activity.
Swimming, skating and classical danc
ing must, in the opinion of Professor
Dearborn, create conditions of physiolog
ical happiness.
Anything that Involves skill tends to
create happiness through the kinesthetic
sense. A slight-of-hand performance, guid
ing a fret-saw, engraving on metal or carv
ing wood, drawing, pitching skilfully a
baseball—all such movements have an in
herent pleasantness. They supply in in
tensity of kinesthesia what they lack in
quantity of stimulation.
The third main factor in making ua feel
good consists of the eplcritic impulses re
ceived from the skin. The many functions
of the skin are still Imperfectly under
stood, but are now being investigated with
interesting results. Only a few specialists
3—Food partlcl*
(E) In Interior of
villus, inhere ltd
fat l« extracted
for th* benefit of
the nervous sys
tem and carried
to th* Unto* of
th* brain and
nerves.
— Intestinal
, showing
particle IE)
about to he ab-
I sorbed Into th*
i digestive system
through the villus
and separated Into
Its different ele
ments.
Professor Dearborn gives an interesting
•ketch of the passage of fat from the in
testine to the nerve cells. The villi are
the chief organs of food absorption from
the intestines. There are about 4,000,000
of these organs in the human. They are
irregular, but in general finger-shaped or
gans, about one-tenth of an inch in
length. Their combined surface area in
creases the absorptive area of the intes
tine at least a hundredfold over what it
would be if the gut were a smooth-walled
tube instead of one partly filled by these
organs. The villus contains among its
many complicated parts a central lympha
tic tnbe, whose chief function is to re
ceive the fat globules and to forward them
into the circulation. Professor Dearborn
says that it is extremely probable that
the mechanism of the villus has as part
of its function the providing of more fat
from other parts of the body for the
nerves. On this basis, he thinks the villus
is understandable as a minute reservoir
of adipose material, perhaps, indeed,
chiefly, for the variable uses of the ner
vous system, nerve cells, and nerve fibres.
Kinesthesia is the second main factor
in the condition of feeling good. It is de
fined as the fundamental behavior sense
and by one authority as the quality by
which we become aware of our position in
•pace. Thousands of hqpulseg, strain# and
1—Section of In- ,
tcntlnal villus. A,
A, lymph corpus- j
cles that absorb
food particles; B,
lymphatic duct
that conveys nour
ishment to nerve
cells; C, wall of
villas; D, border
0f lymphatic duct.
«—Fatty glob
ule (El entering
the heart through
the subclavian
rein fG), on Its
way to the brain
and nervous sys
tem.
7—After psen-
Ing through the
circulation the
fn tty substance
<E) reaches the
lining of the
brain, ahovrn by
shading, and the
nerves.
Experiments have
proved ^hat air
which is "dead,” i.
e., not moving, bu
ild and too warm,
numid and too cold,
or lacking in oxy
gen, is a ready oc-
■ a s io ner of gen
eral discomfort, ill-
defined Irritations in
stomach and intes
tines and a rapidly
rising temperature
in the skin. AH that
science can say on
this point now Is
that dead air means
a lack of movement
over the skin; air
that is humid and
too warm means a
lack of stimulation
by the most suitable
temperature and by
evaporation: air that
is humid and too
cold means similarly
a lack of the most
suitable temperature
and a lack of dryness. Lack of oxygen in
the air, whether from its general chemical
composition or from Its utter deadness
next to the skin, means a lack of stimula
tion, In the various receptors
/The Variou.
Function, of
^ ill. Skin That
Help Us to
“Feel Good.”
1. Protection against Injury. 2. Percep'
sation. 4 Sweat production. B. Lubrlcat
tion. 0. Respiration. 7. Absorption. 8
production.
the human skin are the heat-receptors,
cold-receptors, pain-receptors, pleasure-re
ceptors, tickle-receptors and “arreetores
pilorum,” or “hair raisers."
Evidence accumulates that one large and
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HOT
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