Study links children's lead levels, SAT scores

USA Today by Greg Toppo | Feb. 3, 2009 (News Report)

Could a decades-long drop in the concentration of lead in children's blood help explain rising SAT scores?

A Virginia economist who pored over years of national data says there's an "incredibly strong" correlation, which adds to a growing body of research on lead's harmful effects.

The findings, to be published this winter in the journal Environmental Research, suggest that from 1953 to 2003, the fall and rise of the average SAT math and ... Full Story »

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Celia Sandel
3.3
 by Celia Sandel - Feb. 3, 2009

It is good in that it gives provocative, new information. The the headline could have been improved by indicating the direction of the change -- improvement in both. Had I only read the headline, I would have assumed that this was a story like so many showing rising environmental toxins increasingly depressing health and quality of life. My biggest complaint is that it doesn't provide experts critiquing the study. This type of analysis relies heavily on the quality of the study design and analysis, which the reader is not in a position to measure. There could have been other factors leading to both trends (i.e., distorter variables).

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