Abstract
Purpose: The present study aimed to determine the effect of acute exposure to electromagnetic fields (EMF) emitted by a mobile phone on electrodermal activity (EDA) in response to an auditory stimulus.
Materials and methods: The EDA of 28 young volunteers was recorded following 26 min of exposure to a GSM mobile phone (900 MHz). Palmar sensors enabled repeat recording of 2 min 45 s in the pre-exposure, exposure and post-exposure phases in response to sound stimuli.
Results: The latency, amplitude of skin conductance responses (SCRs), integral of skin conductance response and number of SCRs in response to the auditory stimuli were not modified by exposure. Skin conductance and tonic activity decomposition of the recorded signal were significantly different between the two sessions (p < .0001), but the changes could not be attributed to EMF exposure. There was also a tendency toward a fast reduction in the amplitude and number of electrodermal responses after placement of the mobile phone. In response to successive stimuli, there was a significant difference between the first response and subsequent responses for all variables except latency.
Conclusions: Our results showed a decrease in the number of responses and their amplitude as a result of placement of the mobile device and whether it was turned ‘on’ or ‘off’, but there were no changes associated with exposure to GSM radiofrequency waves in this group of volunteers.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank Jean-François Lambert for his precious advice.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
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Notes on contributors
Brahim Selmaoui
Brahim Selmaoui is director of research at the Department of Toxicology, INERIS in Verneuil-en-Halatte, and senior researcher at the Peritox lab in the University of Picardie Jules Verne, Amiens.
Soafara Andrianome
Soafara Andrianome, past PhD student, Department of Toxicology, INERIS.
Rania Ghosn
Rania Ghosn, past PhD student, Department of Toxicology, INERIS.
René de Seze
René de Seze is senior researcher at the Department of Toxicology, INERIS and at the Peritox lab in the University of Picardie Jules Verne.