People’s abilities to read emotions or concentrate on tasks can be diminished by short-term exposure to particulate matter (PM) air pollution. This may make routine activities, such as doing the weekly grocery shopping, more difficult, according to a recent study.
Short-term exposure to particulate matter (PM) air pollution can hinder people’s ability to interpret emotions and maintain focus on tasks, making everyday activities like grocery shopping potentially more challenging, a new study shows.
Researchers found that even a short duration of exposure to high levels of PM can affect one’s capacity to concentrate on tasks, fend off distractions, and act appropriately in social situations.
In this study, participants were exposed to high levels of air pollution created by candle smoke or to clean air. Their cognitive skills were assessed before and four hours after exposure, measuring factors like working memory, selective attention, emotion recognition, psychomotor speed, and sustained attention.
In findings published today (February 6) in Nature Communications, scientists from the Universities of Birmingham and Manchester observed that both selective attention and emotion recognition suffered due to air pollution exposure—this was true whether participants breathed normally or only through their mouths.
The researchers propose that inflammation resulting from pollution might cause these impairments, emphasizing that while selective attention and emotion recognition were impacted, working memory remained unaffected. This suggests that some cognitive functions are more resilient against short-term pollution exposure.
Dr. Thomas Faherty, a co-author from the University of Birmingham, stated: “Our study offers strong evidence that even short-term exposure to particulate matter can lead to immediate negative effects on brain functions essential for daily tasks, such as grocery shopping.”
Professor Francis Pope, another co-author from the University of Birmingham, remarked: “Poor air quality hinders intellectual growth and workforce productivity, with important societal and economic consequences in our technology-driven world that heavily relies on cognitive skills.”
“Decreased productivity influences economic expansion, underscoring the urgent need for more stringent air quality regulations and public health initiatives to address the harmful effects of pollution on brain health, particularly in severely polluted urban regions.”
Cognitive functioning includes a wide range of mental processes vital for daily endeavors. For instance, selective attention facilitates decision-making and goal-oriented activities, like organizing items on your shopping list while ignoring distractions and resisting impulse buys.
Working memory acts as a temporary storage space for holding and processing information, which is critical for tasks that involve multitasking, such as organizing schedules or managing multiple conversations.
Socio-emotional cognition, the ability to recognize and interpret emotions in ourselves and others, assists in navigating socially acceptable behaviors. Although these cognitive skills are distinct, they collaborate to enable effective task completion both at work and beyond.
The study underscores the necessity for further research to explore how air pollution affects cognitive functioning and to examine the long-term consequences, especially on vulnerable groups such as children and the elderly.
Professor Gordon McFiggans from the University of Manchester stated: “This study highlights the importance of understanding the effects of air pollution on cognitive functions and the need to investigate how various pollution sources influence brain health in at-risk elderly populations.”
This research is the first to systematically analyze how different inhalation routes of PM air pollution can impact cognitive functions, providing crucial insights. The researchers stress the importance of further exploring long-term effects and potential protective strategies.
Globally, air pollution is the primary environmental risk factor affecting human health, significantly contributing to premature deaths. The negative effects of poor air quality on cardiovascular and respiratory health are well-documented, with associations to neurodegenerative diseases like multiple sclerosis, Alzheimer’s, and Parkinson’s disease.
Particulate matter (PM2.5) is the type of air pollution most directly linked to human health problems, with around 4.2 million deaths attributed to it in 2015. The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends that 24-hour and annual exposure levels remain below 15 μg m?3 and 5 μg m?3 respectively.
