Multilevel analysis of air pollution and early childhood neurobehavioral development

To investigate the association between the ambient air pollution levels during the prenatal and postnatal stages and early childhood neurobehavioral development, our study recruited 533 mother-infant pairs from 11 towns in Taiwan. All study subjects were asked to complete childhood neurobehavioral development scales and questionnaires at 6 and 18 months. Air pollution, including particulate matter ≤10 μm (PM10), carbon monoxide (CO), sulfur dioxide (SO2), nitrogen dioxide (NO2), ozone (O3), and hydrocarbons, was measured at air quality monitoring stations in the towns where the subjects lived. Multilevel analyses were applied to assess the association between air pollution and childhood neurobehavioral development during pregnancy and when the children were 0 to 6 months, 7 to 12 months, and 13 to 18 months old. At 18 months, poor subclinical neurodevelopment in early childhood is associated with the average SO2 exposure of prenatal, during all trimesters of pregnancy and at postnatal ages up to 12 months (first trimester β = -0.083, se = 0.030; second and third trimester β = -0.114, se = 0.045; from birth to 12 months of age β = -0.091, se = 0.034). Furthermore, adverse gross motor below average scores at six months of age were associated with increased average non-methane hydrocarbon, (NMHC) levels during the second and third trimesters (β = -8.742, se = 3.512). Low-level SO2 exposure prenatally and up to twelve months postnatal could cause adverse neurobehavioral effects at 18 months of age. Maternal NMHC exposure during the 2nd and 3rd trimesters of pregnancy would be also associated with poor gross motor development in their children at 6 months of age.