LearN - Learning in Noise

Abstract:

During the last decades, the strength of evidence linking noise exposure to negative health, cognitive and learning outcomes has steadily increased. Children are among the most vulnerable to the effects of noise, lacking coping strategies and mature cognitive skills to contrast its effects. Whereas models of how noise affects listening and speech-perception have been developed, the routes through which classroom noise produces learning deficits are still largely uncertain and models of how noise affects children’s cognition and academic performance are lacking. Solutions to noise problems can be found only when noise and its effects are not seen in isolation, but within a larger frame that considers children’s audiological, cognitive and motivational factors, the learning tasks, and developmental differences in learning. The LEARN project aims to advance knowledge and practice in this area by: 1) developing and testing a multigroup structural equation model of the effects of classroom noise on school performance. The model aims at describing the routes and mechanisms through which noise impacts a domain that is particularly vulnerable to noise effects: literacy; 2) developing and pilot testing a noise-awareness and management intervention focused on two components: a children-centered and teacher-centered training. The hypothesis guiding the intervention is that class noise control can be reached most effectively through a two-component training: the first aimed at raising children’s awareness of noise and providing them with simple noise-management strategies, the second aimed at developing teachers’ classroom-management skills.