How to silence unruly pupils

The Daily Mail reports on an interesting piece of research. backgroud noise may help unruly pupils pay more attention in class. Scientists found 'white noise' helped children with ADHD concentrate. The same was true for children with no behavioural disorder but who under-achieved at school.

In contrast, brighter pupils, without ADHD, were put off by noise and performed better in silence.

Researcher Goran Soderlund of Stockholm University, who led the study, said: "The discovery is surprising, since previous research has indicated that children with ADHD are easily disturbed in distracting environments."

A group of 42 children aged nine to 13 took part in the first test, half of whom had ADHD.
They were read a list of 96 verbal command sentences, such as "roll the ball" or "break the match". They were then asked to recall as many of the sentences as they could.

Those without ADHD remembered more sentences when the task was carried out in silence.
But those with ADHD did better when subjected to white noise - a whooshing sound similar to the static from a radio tuned between stations.

A possible explanation for the findings, published in the journal Psychological Review, involves
dopamine, a neuro-chemical that helps control brain activity. Low achieving and ADHD children are deficient in dopamine, said the scientists. For them, noise appears to stimulate the brain just enough to make it function better.

But the brains of children with normal levels of dopamine may be over-stimulated, lowering their ability to concentrate and remember.

Does anyone have any experience of this in practice?