482 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 
CHILD STUDY 
By Proressor BH. A. KIRKPATRICK 
FITCHBURG, MASS. 
baa sciences concerned with man and the conditions most favorable 
to his physical, mental and moral development have received a 
great deal of attention during the last quarter of a century and the 
results are most striking. It is found that there is tremendous waste 
of adult human life in preventable deaths and injuries caused by disease 
and accidents, and immense waste of human energy in idleness and 
misapplied effort, while morality is shown to depend to a much greater 
extent than was formerly supposed upon proper housing, feeding and 
recreative and social opportunities. 
It has been demonstrated that the death rate of infants may easily 
be decreased one half by supplying pure milk to mothers together with 
directions and the help of nurses in caring for babies. Children are 
not only dying in entirely unnecessary numbers, but a great many are 
born defective or caused to become so by improper treatment, so that 
they must be cared for by the state, at enormous expense. It has also 
been clearly demonstrated that there is an immense waste of time and 
energy in the public schools, and that the output of efficient individuals 
is far below what it should be; also, that because of early employment, 
lack of play grounds and other causes great numbers are shut up in 
reform schools and jails, instead of being prepared for performing the 
duties of citizens. 
Although the government has, as yet, done almost nothing in the 
way of scientific research along these lines, as compared with that which 
it has done in agriculture, yet enough has already been established by 
the investigations of private individuals, societies and universities to 
prove clearly that a large part of this destructive waste and perversion 
of human life, energy and effort can be prevented by means now known 
to be efficient. 
There is good ground also for the belief that still further enormous 
saving may be effected after the complex facts of child and social life 
have been more thoroughly investigated. While the government appro- 
priates millions for researches in agriculture and the diffusion of the 
results among the people, it was a hard task to get an appropriation of 
forty-five thousand dollars for human education. In the last congress 
a bill appropriating fifteen hundred dollars for child study was defeated, 
and immediately afterward, fifteen thousand was appropriated for 
