Be aware of air

Apr 3, 2018 | I'm a Parent

 

There is a lot in the news about greenhouse gases and their effect on climate change. There is also a lot written about the the appalling air pollution in Asia, which is the reason for many Asian’s habit of wearing face masks in an attempt to protect themselves.  But what is the position in South Africa – and why should we be concerned for our children?

 

Young children are particularly vulnerable to air quality because they are smaller than adults. With every breath, they take in more air per unit of adult weight than adults. This means that if air contains toxins, they will be breathing in proportionately more toxic air than adults do.  This is why air pollution is associated with childhood diseases such as pneumonia, asthma, bronchitis and other respiratory conditions.  These can be debilitating, resulting in children missing school and possibly causing long-lasting damage to their health and well-being.

 

But there are also implications for children’s developing brains. We are told that the first 1 000 days of life are crucial to a child’s future. This is the period when the brain undergoes the most critical and rapid growth – and the neurons (brain cells) and neural connections formed during this stage of brain development provide the foundation for all future, healthy brain structure and function.  In other words, this period is crucial for children’s ability to later learn and fulfill their potential in life.

 

Air pollution can affect children’s brains by several mechanisms.   Firstly, certain pollutants can break down the blood-brain barrier, which is a delicate membrane protecting the brain from toxic substances.  Once this barrier is breached, toxins may enter and damage the brain.  Secondly, very tiny air pollution particles can enter the body through the olfactory nerve and the gut.  One of these is Magnetite, which is common in urban outdoor pollution and is highly toxic to the brain.  Thirdly, some forms of pollutants formed from fossil fuel combustion can contribute to damage of brain cells that are needed to help neurons communicate throughout the brain.  These connections are vital for learning.

Where do you live?

In 2016, the South African authorities that track air pollution updated the regions of our country that have the most polluted air.  Not surprising, densely populated cities are on this list but other smaller areas also make the list due to mining operations in their proximity.  You might be surprised that the area in the top spot is Hartebeespoort. The reason for this is its location. It is close to both Johannesburg and Pretoria, as well as several mining operations. Overall, (according to the latest report) it ranks 162nd as the most air-polluted area in the world.

Here are the most air-polluted areas in our country:

  1. Hartebeespoort
  2. Tshwane
  3. Johannesburg
  4. Vereeniging
  5. Sebokeng
  6. Mpumalanga
  7. Zamdela 
  8. Secunda
  9. Dieploof
  10. Waterberg
  11. Witbank
  12. Ermelo
  13. Cape Town
  14. Durban
  15. Middelburg

So, what to do if you live in one of these areas?  There are some things that you can try, which is what I’ll write about in the next post.

 

Martin Doherty, writing for The Conversation, says that at the age of about four, children reach important milestones in brain development.

One of these is a huge improvement in understanding others’ thoughts and feelings. This is the start of empathy.  Another is in spatial thinking—understanding how objects are positioned and related. This is the beginning of the ability to read maps.

Martin and his colleague, Catherine Sayer, conducted a study with 175 two to five-year-olds to explore how children are able to use scale models to figure out where something is in the real world. At about four, children are able to use a scale model of a room to work out where something is. We thought that this might result from children’s understanding of how one thing can represent something else. But we actually found that four-year-olds’ ability to use scale models came from their spatial abilities.

At the same age, children start to understand that someone’s behaviour is due to what that person believes, not necessarily what is really the case. This has interesting consequences.

If you’ve played hide-and-seek with young children, you may have noticed that they aren’t always very good at it. They love the ritual of looking in all the wrong places first, but beforehand they may tell you where they are going to hide, hide in the same place every time, or not be especially hidden.

After their fourth birthday, they get much better at hide and seek. They understand that the seeker looks in the wrong places because they don’t know where the hider is.

At about three to four children also start to tell lies. They realize they can make someone believe something that isn’t true.

Understanding symbols

Martin’s earlier research with fellow psychologist Josef Perner suggests that four-year-olds don’t just start to understand how others’ minds work. Figuring this out is part of the development of an understanding of “representation”—that symbols, like thoughts, words, or pictures, can be used to stand for something else.

Children start to think about how words relate to objects. This means, for instance, knowing that “animal” can refer to something you already have a name for, such as “rabbit”. This might help children learn the new word.

Their ability to use a understand the components of pictures also improves around this age. Very young children use a lot of trial and error to complete a jigsaw, picking up random pieces to see if they fit. By the time they are about four years old, they start to use the picture as a guide, trying to connect lines and match bits of colour, while checking the guide picture on the box lid.

Developmental experiments

Another ability children develop at around four is using scale models. A classic set of developmental experiments involved a model of a regular household room. The real room had typical furniture—sofa, table, cupboard and so on—and the model had miniature versions laid out in the same way.

Children were shown where something was hidden in the model and told to find an object hidden in “the same place” in the room. Children of around four can find the object using the identical layouts. If shown a sticker under a particular chair in the model room, for example, they can go straight to the “same” chair in the other room. This is the fundamental understanding required to read maps.

Adults see scale models and maps as representations. Maps represent a town or a country. A scale model of, say, the Eiffel Tower represents the real thing. At first, Martin suspected children’s ability to use scale models is more evidence of understanding representation at this age.

He was wrong. Instead, the researchers found that this ability is based on a development in children’s spatial abilities that also occurs at about four. This is the ability to think about spaces and where objects are within them. Spatial abilities help with maths skills, and good spatial ability is linked to an interest in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

Their experiment was simple. They compared the model room task with a test of understanding how representation works. The two abilities develop around the same age, but they found they were not related. Children who could do one task couldn’t necessarily do the other.

They also had a test of purely spatial ability. Children who passed the model room task also passed the spatial task. So it looks like the model room task relied on children‘s spatial thinking.

They don’t yet know why two important but apparently unrelated abilities arise at the same time. Perhaps it’s related to changes in the growing brain at this  interesting age.

Provided by The Conversation. 

Image supplied by Freepik.