An attempt to correct some of the misstatements made by Sir Victor Horsley ... and Mary D. Sturge, M.D. in the criticisms of the Galton laboratory memoir: A first study of the influence of parental alcoholism, &c / by Karl Pearson, F.R.S.

  • Pearson, Karl, 1857-1936.
Date:
1911
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Credit: An attempt to correct some of the misstatements made by Sir Victor Horsley ... and Mary D. Sturge, M.D. in the criticisms of the Galton laboratory memoir: A first study of the influence of parental alcoholism, &c / by Karl Pearson, F.R.S. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    10/48 (page 8)
    8 A REPLY TO CRITICISMS OF THE This applies to both the Manchester and Edinburgh data alike. Roughly this ratio may be taken as 4/5, or an excess of 1/5 in the deaths of children of drinking father or mother has to be accounted for. Now how did we write about this excess? Quite undogmatically and as follows (p. 37) : ' Some of this excess of child deaths is certainly due to accident, to overlaying, to burns, and to other causes arising from carelessness, but we should be inclined to attribute it, at least in part, to the same causes, probably to want of home care, to food defects, perhaps to other factors possibly toxic, which show themselves in slightly less height and weight among the children of the drinking mothers when these children reach a school age.' When we remember that there is a fairly high correlation between the use of a ' dummy teat ' or ' baby pacifier ' and infantile mortality, the reader will understand what we mean by the carelessness or uncleanliness that leads to the death of a child. Our final conclusion on this subject was (p. 31): ' There is a higher death-rate among the offspring of alcoholic than among the offspring of sober parents. This appears to be more marked in the case of the mother than the father, and since it is sensibly higher in the case of the mother who has drinking bouts than of the mother who habitually drinks, it would appear to be due very consider¬ ably to accidents and gross carelessness, and possibly in a minor degree to toxic effect on the offspring.' Why did we not attribute it to toxic effect, or only to that source in a minor degree ? Because our statistics showed no such differentiation in general health between the children of the two classes, and because the effect in¬ creased with the 'bouting'. Notwithstanding that we directly appealed to carelessness and neglect in the home environment as a source of the higher death-rate, what statement do Sir Victor and Dr. Sturge put into our