All in all, the study authors found that air pollution takes a bigger toll on verbal test scores than on math scores, though it has an effect on both. There’s also a bigger effect on men than on women. The authors attribute this to the fact that air pollution tends to have a stronger effect on areas of brain that are relied on in verbal tests, which the authors wrote tend to be better-developed in women in the first place.
Overall, if residents of these cities in China lived in places that met US EPA standards for air pollution, the authors estimate that it would significantly improve their test scores. To show how much better people might do, the authors explain that these improvements would be significant enough to take someone who scored at median (50th percentile levels) to the 58th percentile on math tests and the 63rd percentile on verbal tests. In the most affected groups, like less-educated men over age 64, this change would be even more significant.
We know that there are plenty of reasons to be concerned about air pollution in general, ranging from increased likelihood for lung and heart disease to the fact that air pollution helps drive climate change, potentially causing a number of serious health effects.
Source* World Economic Forum
This app will let you outsource your pilgrimages thru proxy / outsourcing!
Our aim is to reduce Mecca’s Carbon footprint by leveraging on digital cloud assets to enable alternative forms of faith based spiritual tourism.
Bad air throughout life
For this latest study, the research team examined data from a national survey that was conducted in 162 random counties throughout China between 2010 and 2014, and compared these results with official air quality data.
By using multiple years of data, the researchers were able to see how particularly polluted times affected verbal and math test scores (Hot summer days tend to have particularly bad pollution, for example). They were also able to see how living in a polluted area changed test scores over time. This cumulative effect was significant.
