Assuming that pupils who are not allergic to pollen are also not affected by the pollen count, the results show that one in ten
pupils with hay fever dropped one grade when the pollen count increased by a standard deviation.
«The results appear to show that
pupils with pollen allergies don't have the same opportunities to study what they want to at university — not because their skills are inferior, but because they are suffering from
hay fever symptoms during the exams,» says Bensnes.