Ever feel scatterbrained for no reason? It might not be you—the air you’re breathing.
A new study suggests that even an hour of exposure to air pollution can mess with your focus and emotional perception.
How Air Pollution Affect Your Focus?
Researchers tested 26 participants, exposing some to clean air and others to high particulate matter (PM)—the kind of pollution found in car exhaust or candle smoke.
Those who inhaled polluted air struggled to tune out distractions and recognize emotions in others.
“Imagine walking through a supermarket—you might get distracted by impulse buys because you can’t focus on your task,” explained Dr Thomas Faherty from the University of Birmingham.
Even more unsettling, exposure to pollution impaired emotional recognition, making participants worse at distinguishing between happy and fearful faces.
Faherty speculates this could influence social behavior or even crime rates.
The study, published in Nature Communications, found that working memory remained intact, but selective attention and emotional processing suffered.
With air pollution already linked to millions of premature deaths annually, scientists warn that its effects on cognitive function could have serious consequences.
