How Air Pollution Contributes to Childhood Mental Health Disorders
Published June 2019 | Environmental Research
A series of three studies by scientists at Cincinnati Children’s and the University of Cincinnati (UC) demonstrate a surprising connection between air pollution and mental health in children.
The first finding, published in June 2019, was led by Kimberly Yolton, PhD, and Patrick Ryan, PhD. It reported that exposure to traffic related air pollution (TRAP) was significantly associated with self-reported depression and anxiety symptoms in 12-year-olds. Each 0.25μg/m3 increase in pollution exposure was associated with a 3.5 point increase Child Depression Inventory-2 (CDI-2) scores and a 2.3 point increase in total anxiety and significant increases on other scales in the Spence Children’s Anxiety Scale (SCAS).
A second study published in August in Environmental Research used magnetic resonance spectroscopy to discover that children with higher TRAP exposure also had higher myoinositol concentrations in their brains. This marker of neuroinflammatory response also was associated with elevated self-reported generalized anxiety. This work was led by Kelly Brunst, PhD, at UC and Kim Cecil, PhD, at Cincinnati Children’s.
A third population-based study, published online Sept. 25, 2019, in Environmental Health Perspectives, found that short-term exposure to air pollution was associated with increased emergency visits to Cincinnati Children’s for exacerbations of psychiatric disorders in children. This study was led by Cole Brokamp, PhD, and Patrick Ryan.
Much of the data the teams analyzed was gathered through the Cincinnati Childhood Allergy and Air Pollution Study, which demonstrated significant connections between TRAP exposure and respiratory disorder risk.
“Collectively, these studies contribute to the growing body of evidence that air pollution exposure during childhood may contribute to depression, anxiety, and other mental health problems in adolescence,” Ryan says. “More research is needed to find the mechanisms behind these associations.”
