A study of 105 babies in India showed that those who lived in homes with high and medium levels of wireless radiation — including Wi-Fi routers, cellphones and nearby cell towers — exhibited, on average, worse fine motor, communication and problem-solving skills than babies in homes with lower levels of wireless radiation.

Babies living in homes with high levels of wireless radiation were more than three times as likely to develop problem-solving difficulties and nearly three times as likely to have fine motor delays compared with infants in homes with low levels of wireless radiation, according to a new peer-reviewed study.

"Having data to show that the normal development of children is under assault by a nearby antenna or Wi-Fi router should alert the public to this dire situation," said Dr. Robert Brown, vice president of Scientific Research and Clinical Affairs for the Environmental Health Trust. "People need to wake up."

Children are affected more strongly by wireless radiation than adults, according to the authors' report:

"Since children have a developing nervous system with higher water content and ion concentration, their brain tissue is more susceptible to impairment due to the energy emitted from the cell phones held next to the head than that of adults.

"About twice as much mobile phone energy is absorbed in the peripheral brain tissues of children as compared to adults."

The study was published July 10 in Cureus, a Springer Nature journal.

What researchers found

The study showed babies in the high- and medium-exposure groups performed worse, on average, than babies in the low-exposure group on skills including gross motor, fine motor, communication, problem-solving and personal-social.

Babies in the high- and medium-exposure groups were more than three times as likely to show delays in problem-solving skills, such as figuring out how to reach a toy, than those in the low-exposure group (3.67 and 3.12, respectively).

Babies in the high-exposure group were nearly three times more likely (2.74) to display hand-eye coordination delays, such as difficulty stacking blocks, compared with the low-exposure group.