Smoking And Hearing Problems

Editor's Choice
Main Category: Smoking / Quit Smoking
Also Included In: Hearing / Deafness;  Neurology / Neuroscience;  Pediatrics / Children's Health
Article Date: 03 Jan 2008 - 7:00 PDT

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A teenager who smokes may find it harder to understand what other people are saying, according to an article published in The New Scientist. The risk is also there if a teenager's mother smoked while she was pregnant with him/her.

Leslie Jacobsen of Yale University School of Medicine and team used diffusion tensor imaging. This measures how water diffuses through brain tissue. They studied 33 teenagers - all their mothers had smoked during pregnancy. Twenty-five of the teens whose mothers had smoked during pregnancy were daily smokers themselves. They also studied another 34 teenagers whose mothers had not smoked during pregnancy - 14 of these teenagers were daily smokers.

Children with more white matter tend to have more problems interpreting sounds, the scientists explain. The scans revealed that the teenagers who were exposed to nicotine also had more white matter than those who did not. Nicotine stimulates acetylcholine. Over-stimulated acetylcholine leads to the over-production of white matter.

The teenagers, aged 13-18 were given a test. They had to recognize words by hearing them while being exposed to background noise and visual images (distractions). The boys who had been exposed to nicotine got 77% of the words right, compared to 85% for those who had not been exposed. The girls who had been exposed got 84% right, compared to 90% for those who had not been exposed.

The researchers explained that people who are affected will have problems in settings where there is a distraction, such as in the classroom when other people are talking and there is a lot going on. Combine this problem with other conditions, such as behavioral disorders, and the chances of a child failing at school are greater.

"Teenage smokers risk badly wired brains"
Linda Geddes
New Scientist Magazine issue 2637
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Written by - Christian Nordqvist
Copyright: Medical News Today
Not to be reproduced without permission of Medical News Today

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