The effect of aircraft and road traffic noise on the cognitive performance, annoyance and blood pressure of primary school children. Aircraft noise is related to a decrease in reading comprehension levels among primary schoolchildren around three European airports. The percentage of severe annoyance increases with the aircraft noise level. The relation between aircraft noise and blood pressure is not quite consistent.These are the main results of the largest study of its kind, carried out among primary schoolchildren to investigate the effect of aircraft and road traffic noise on children's cognition, annoyance and blood pressure. The results indicate that the findings of recent studies of the effects of aircraft noise on cognition are applicable for the situation around Schiphol Airport. Effects of aircraft noise are also observed on memory: a decrease in recognition memory is found. Aircraft noise exposure is related to an increase in mistakes on a switching attention test. It is estimated that 50-3000 (0.1 - 2.5%) additional pupils in the last 4 classes of primary schools around Schiphol Airport have a relatively low test result for reading comprehension due to aircraft noise exposure. Normally, 9% have a relatively low score.An estimated 3400 (2.9%) pupils in the last 4 classes of the primary schools in the Schiphol area are severely annoyed at school due to aircraft noise.In the Dutch sample aircraft noise exposure is related to increased blood pressure; this was not the case in the British sample, and evidence in the literature is inconsistent. Therefore no unequivocal conclusions can be drawn with regard to the effect of noise on the blood pressure in children. (Author/publisher)
Abstract