How Air Pollution Can Affect Kids’ Future Behavior, Health and Learning

Children exposed to higher levels of air pollution in their homes from birth to age 3 may develop weaker connections between key brain regions, with potentially long-lasting effects on future learning, behavior and health, according to one of the first studies of its kind.

The study is one of the first to explore how air pollution affects neurological connections when the brain is not actively engaged in a task, using brain scans taken multiple times in a large population-based group of children from birth, says lead author Michelle Kusters.

Published in February in Environment International, the researchers found:

• More exposure to air pollution was linked to weaker connections between different brain networks.
• Early exposure affected the connection between the amygdala (a region involved in emotional regulation) and brain regions involved in attention, movement and sensation, and hearing (hippocampus and caudate nucleus). This was especially true of exposure to PM2.5, which can penetrate deep into the lungs.
• Ongoing exposure, particularly to PM10, a larger particle size, caused changes in the connections between brain networks (salience and medial-parietal networks) responsible for higher thinking and decision-making.