Neurobehavioral effects of transportation noise in primary schoolchildren: a cross-sectional study

Environmental Health

Research

Stephen Stansfeld¹  Irene van Kamp²  Erik Lebret²  Elise van Kempen²  Harry Emmen³  Jan Lammers³ 

[1] Barts and the London, Queen Mary, University of London, London, UK;National Institute for Public Health and the Environment, Centre for Environmental Health Research, Bilthoven, The Netherlands;TNO Quality of Life, Zeist, The Netherlands;

关键词: Noise Exposure;    Dyslexia;    Aircraft Noise;    Road Traffic Noise;    Neurobehavioral Test;   

DOI  :  10.1186/1476-069X-9-25

 received in 2009-09-28, accepted in 2010-06-01,  发布年份 2010

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundDue to shortcomings in the design, no source-specific exposure-effect relations are as yet available describing the effects of noise on children's cognitive performance. This paper reports on a study investigating the effects of aircraft and road traffic noise exposure on the cognitive performance of primary schoolchildren in both the home and the school setting.MethodsParticipants were 553 children (age 9-11 years) attending 24 primary schools around Schiphol Amsterdam Airport. Cognitive performance was measured by the Neurobehavioral Evaluation System (NES), and a set of paper-and-pencil tests. Multilevel regression analyses were applied to estimate the association between noise exposure and cognitive performance, accounting for demographic and school related confounders.ResultsEffects of school noise exposure were observed in the more difficult parts of the Switching Attention Test (SAT): children attending schools with higher road or aircraft noise levels made significantly more errors. The correlational pattern and factor structure of the data indicate that the coherence between the neurobehavioral tests and paper-and-pencil tests is high.ConclusionsBased on this study and previous scientific literature it can be concluded that performance on simple tasks is less susceptible to the effects of noise than performance on more complex tasks.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© van Kempen et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. 2010