ArticleBehavioral and brain functions : BBF2010
The effects of background white noise on memory performance in inattentive school children.
Article in Behavioral and brain functions : BBF, 2010. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 65 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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Who cites it
65 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 170 citations in OpenAlex.
- Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis: Do White Noise or Pink Noise Help With Task Performance in Youth With Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder or With Elevated Attention Problems?Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry · 2024Pooled it
- Classroom acoustics as a consideration for inclusive education in South Africa.The South African journal of communication disorders = Die Suid-Afrikaanse tydskrif vir Kommunikasieafwykings · 2017Pooled it
- Verbal learning in the context of background music: no influence of vocals and instrumentals on verbal learning.Behavioral and brain functions : BBF · 2014Trial
- Good vibrations--effects of whole body vibration on attention in healthy individuals and individuals with ADHD.PloS one · 2014Trial
- Music and video as distractors for boys with ADHD in the classroom: comparison with controls, individual differences, and medication effects.Journal of abnormal child psychology · 2011Trial
- Effects of White Noise on Academic Skills in Children with ADHD and Specific Learning Disorders: New Perspectives for Personalised Rehabilitation and Educational Intervention.Pediatric reports · 2026Article
- Double stochastic resonance in stink bug sexual communication.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Sex dependency of subconscious visual perception.Biology of sex differences · 2025Article
- Impact of white noise on spatial navigation of people without visual cues.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- The Influence of Noise Exposure on Cognitive Function in Children and Adolescents: A Meta-Analysis.NeuroSci · 2025Review
- Sensory stimulation enhances visual working memory capacity.Communications psychology · 2024Article
- Task-irrelevant stimuli reliably boost phasic pupil-linked arousal but do not affect decision formation.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- Article
- Fractal Phototherapy in Maximizing Retina and Brain Plasticity.Advances in neurobiology · 2024Article
- Sensory white noise in clinical ADHD: Who benefits from noise, and who performs worse?Scandinavian journal of child and adolescent psychiatry and psychology · 2024Article
- Article
- Noise and Financial Stylized Facts: A Stick Balancing Approach.Entropy (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Article
- White Noise and Its Potential Applications in Occupational Health: A Review.Iranian journal of public health · 2023Review
- Training augmentation using additive sensory noise in a lunar rover navigation task.Frontiers in neuroscience · 2023Article
- Effects of additive sensory noise on cognition.Frontiers in human neuroscience · 2023Article
5 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors at 3 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundNoise is typically conceived of as being detrimental for cognitive performance; however, a recent computational model based on the concepts of stochastic resonance and dopamine related internal noise postulates that a moderate amount of auditive noise benefit individuals in hypodopaminergic states. On the basis of this model we predicted that inattentive children would be enhanced by adding background white noise while attentive children's performance would deteriorate.
methodsFifty-one secondary school pupils carried out an episodic verbal free recall test in two noise conditions. In the high noise condition, verb-noun sentences were presented during auditory background noise (white noise, 78 dB), and in the low noise condition sentences were presented without noise.
resultsExposure to background noise improved performance for inattentive children and worsened performance for attentive children and eliminated episodic memory differences between attentive and inattentive school children.
conclusionsConsistent with the model, our data show that cognitive performance can be moderated by external background white noise stimulation in a non-clinical group of inattentive participants. This finding needs replicating in a larger sample using more noise levels but if replicated has great practical applications by offering a non-invasive way to improve school results in children with attentional problems.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.