Mobile phone effects on children's event-related oscillatory EEG during an auditory memory task

Abstract

Purpose: To assess the effects of electromagnetic fields (EMF) emitted by mobile phones (MP) on the 1 – 20 Hz event-related brain oscillatory EEG (electroencephalogram) responses in children performing an auditory memory task (encoding and recognition).

Materials and methods: EEG data were gathered while 15 subjects (age 10 – 14 years) performed an auditory memory task both with and without exposure to a digital 902 MHz MP in counterbalanced order.

Results: During memory encoding, the active MP modulated the event-related desynchronization/synchronization (ERD/ERS) responses in the ∼4 – 8 Hz EEG frequencies. During recognition, the active MP transformed these brain oscillatory responses in the ∼4 – 8 Hz and ∼15 Hz frequencies.

Conclusions: The current findings suggest that EMF emitted by mobile phones has effects on brain oscillatory responses during cognitive processing in children.

Keywords:

• EEG
• EMF
• mobile phone
• ERD/ERS
• GSM
• memory
• children