Air pollution makes people want ... to commit crimes

New scientific research finds that polluted air is not only fatal, it also seriously affects human mental health.

In the future, anti-crime police may have to pay attention to the pollution level of the city to mobilize forces on "dark days ".

An Indian woman wears a mask to deal with the bleak polluted atmosphere - (Photo: AFP).

It may sound unbelievable, but recent studies have found that air pollution not only causes death but also mental problems , reducing the ability to think, judge and increase crime rates in the community. .

This is a worrying news, because now more than half of the world's population is living in an urban environment and more and more people are moving in crowded, cramped areas. The World Health Organization (WHO) statistics 9 out of 10 urban people regularly inhale dirty air.

We already know that air pollution kills about 7 million people every year, but its impact on mental health is a recent discovery.

In 2011, London School of Economics researcher Sefi Roth found that polluted air affects students' learning ability. On highly polluted days, the test scores of the monitored students are always low compared to the clear days.

"Even a few days ago and then we did not find the effect, just on the day the air was contaminated, the scores of the tests suddenly went down," Mr. Roth observed.

Like the body, the brain also needs clean air to function and develop - (Photo: BBC).

In another study in 2018, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (USA) appraised data of more than 9,000 cities - almost all of the United States, and they found that air pollution is an indicator of nine dangerous crimes. , including murder, rape, robbery, car theft and violence.

Accordingly, the cities with the highest levels of pollution are also home to the highest crime rates. Despite compensating for factors such as population, unemployment, age and gender, scientists still see pollution as a major factor predicting crime rates.

Other evidence comes from Southern California University's research on "illegal behavior" (fraud, theft, vandalism .). Observing 682 teenagers, researcher Diana Younan and colleagues found that those who were exposed regularly to PM2.5 fine dust environments would have more bad behavior.

Younan said she was extremely worried before discovering how an individual behaves during the teenage years most likely to become such an adult. This group is often poorly educated, easily unemployed, addicted .

Air pollution is thought to cause many mental illnesses - (Photo: BBC).

In addition to the tendency to commit crimes, air pollution is also bad news for mental health. A March-2019 study by King's College London found that teenagers exposed to toxic air are at higher risk of developing neurological diseases, such as paranoia .

Researcher Joanne Newbury is cautious about the findings, but she judges that the results are similar to other studies on the connection between air pollution and mental health.

In many countries around the world, anti-pollution regulations are not really strict. To protect themselves, urban advisers should protect themselves, avoid some activities such as outdoor sports, or move in days of high pollution levels .

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