Exposure to salient, dynamic sensory stimuli during development increases distractibility in adulthood.

ABSTRACT: It has been suggested that excessive exposure of children to the dynamic and highly salient audio-visual stimuli conveyed by electronic media may induce attention-related deficits in adulthood. This study was designed to evaluate this hypothesis in a controlled animal model setup. Building on their natural responsiveness to odors, we exposed juvenile rats for 1 h daily to a dynamic series of interchanging, highly salient odors, while controls were exposed to a non-changing mixture of these odors. Upon reaching adulthood, we tested the attentional capacity of the rats and measured their brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) levels as a proxy of neuronal plasticity. As compared with controls, rats exposed to the dynamic stimulation showed no attentional deficits under baseline task condit

SUBMITTER: Hadas I 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4756326 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature