SALT LAKE CITY — Conventional wisdom tells us kids feel bored at school because they are under-challenged, under-motivated or poorly taught. A 2012 report from the Association for Psychological Science Association says the classic signals of boredom might be telling a different story, according to an Education Week blog by Sarah D. Sparks.

When a child gazes out of a classroom window, fidgets and acts out at school, or heaves a sigh that says "I'm so bored!", the real problem might be outside stressors that can interfere with schoolwork, and even health.

"I think teachers should always try to be relevant and interesting, but beyond that, there are other places to look," Sparks was told by John D. Eastwood, an associate professor of psychology at York University in Toronto, Canada (author of the study). "By definition, to be in the state of boredom is to say the world sucks out there in some way. But often that's not the case; often it's an interior problem, and [students] are looking in the wrong place to solve the problem."

Kids have any number of reasons to feel stressed — disharmony at home, high expectations from parents and teachers, or difficulty getting along with friends are a few that come to mind. A new report by the Urban Institute suggests another: poverty.

Children in poverty are more likely than others to experience poor pre-natal and early childhood care, poor nutrition, lack of intellectual stimulation, frequent moving, and the ramifications of parental unemployment and depression.

Such chronic stressors link childhood poverty to lower levels of working memory and can lead to permanent changes in brain function that hamper later learning, said Urban Institute's "Child Poverty and Its Lasting Consequence" report. Poverty and low school achievement are closely linked within a multi-generational cycle that is difficult to break, the report said.

One possible contributor to school boredom might affect privileged kids as much or more than their poorer peers. An Education Week article by Stanley Pogrow theorizes that easy access to on-demand entertainment makes it increasingly difficult for teachers to hold the interest of the YouTube generation.

"The old standbys of telling students they have to know it because it will be on the test, or making it 'authentic,' that is, trying to convince students they will need to know it as adults, have little effect on many students," Pogrow wrote. "They are not adults, and may be rebelling against adult ideas."