Eye Researchers at the University of California, Riverside and Boston University in the US asked 33 study participants (average age 71) and 18 others (average age 21) to do two days of training, testing their vision before and after. The training consisted of a one-hour session on each of the two days, using different stimuli.
Participants were shown a letter on a background of horizontal lines, along with diagonal lines that formed a shape. Immediately after that they were shown a masking pattern. "The reason for the mask is to limit the processing of the pattern by the visual system," says study author Dr John Anderson, of the University of California. "In essence the mask allows us to examine a person’s ability to process the texture [the first] pattern." After seeing the mask, the participants were asked to say what the letter and the object in the first image were.
After training, all participants improved their test results – both the younger and older groups – even with different letters and objects. The improvement wasn’t short-lived either: when the researchers checked the participants' vision with the same pattern tests three months later, they found it still showed improvements.
As you age, many aspects of vision are affected. Your sensitivity to dark and light, ability to see in reduced light, visual accuracy as well as perception of spaces – how far away a car is and how fast it is moving - for example, diminish. If other aspects of visual acuity can also be improved through practice, then people likely to suffer from loss of acuity could be given exercise regimes to improve it, making day-to-day life – driving, crossing roads and so on – easier and less dangerous.
First published November 25, 2010