New Delhi, Feb. 13 -- You are inching forward in rush-hour traffic, the air thick with exhaust fumes or strolling past a construction site as dust swirls around you. It is an everyday occurrence but what if those invisible particles in the air were quietly dulling your focus, making it harder to concentrate at work and even affecting how you read emotions on people's faces?

According to a new study, that may be exactly what is happening.

A British study published in Nature Communications has found that just one hour of exposure to air pollution can temporarily impair two critical cognitive functions: selective attention (your ability to focus while ignoring distractions) and emotion recognition (your ability to interpret facial expressi...