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Essay 4: Brain-Training Exercises Help Improve Vision

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Essay 4: Brain-Training Exercises Help Improve Vision

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Essay 4- Brain-Training Exercises Help Improve Vision 

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I left several messages and emails for Dr. G. John Andersen and Dr. Denton DeLoss. Neither doctors returned my emails or phone calls. I decided to interview a local optometrist. I asked Dr. Thames several questions regarding my topic of brain-training exercises for better vision. He was not aware of the experiments at UC Riverside and Brown University. He did say that he is not a big proponent of brain-training to improve vision and prefers the "old fashioned" way to improve vision through eye glasses and surgery if necessary.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=isHSxtE5t2c

This source relates to my topic because it explains that with eating the right diet, a person can avoid many diseases related to the eye and vision.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z83L8x0ITdI

This video explains that certain healthy food can help improve eye health. Older adults, along with the brain-training exercises can be used to help improve your eyesight.

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https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25776132-the-brain?from_search=true

In the human consciousness, it is unclear how much control a person has on their daily operations. This includes reading and how your eyes are able to read and understand something. Although we may not be aware that our eyes are moving while we read or observe something visually, we are still able to complete the visual task. "Your eyes aren't moving smoothly across the page; instead, they dart from one fixed point to another. When your eyes are in the middle of a jump they're moving too fast to read. They only take in the text when you stop and fixate on one position, usually for twenty milliseconds or so at a time. We are not aware of these hops and jumps an stops and starts, because your brain goes to a lot of trouble to stabilize your perception of the outside world."

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Eye exercise programs are highly controversial and most vision experts think there is little or no scientific evidence that they work. I think that the advice of the doctors from this "all about vision article" are correct in stating that a person should first have a comprehensive eye exam and consult the optometrist before doing eye exercise programs. "Eye exercises programs occupy a nebulous space somewhere between medical science and folk remedy. Most optometrists and ophthalmologists are dismissive of the types of programs promising that you can "throw away your glasses.""

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Self-help programs of eye exercises that claim to reduce or eliminate your need for glasses and contacts have been around since the 1920s. But before you spend time and money on anything that promises you will be able to "throw away your glasses," be aware that these programs remain highly controversial and most vision experts contend there is little or no scientific evidence that shows they work.

In fact, several popular eye exercise programs have been removed from the marketplace for making apparently false claims about their effectiveness.

For example, an Iowa district court in November 2006 halted all sales of See Clearly Method kits that had been marketed for several years by a company called Vision Improvement Technologies as a way to improve vision through eye exercises.

Based on allegations that included misleading advertising, the state court ordered the Iowa company to pay $200,000 into a restitution fund to compensate consumers who had paid about $350 for each of thousands of kits.

In the lawsuit, Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller accused the company of making "dramatic claims for its product that could not be substantiated."

Steven M. Beresford, PhD, is founder and CEO of American Vision Institute (AVI) - the entity behind the original See Clearly Method. Beresford told AllAboutVision.com via e-mail in late 2008: "In our opinion, the Iowa attorney general was paid off by the AOA [American Optometric Association] by means of a bribe or campaign contribution to carry out a proxy attack."

AVI operates a website that offers a new Power Vision Program "consisting of the most effective techniques of the See Clearly Method," according to the company. The Power Vision Program, which AVI claims can "reduce, perhaps even eliminate your dependency on glasses or contact lenses," can be downloaded from the company's website for $35.

Self-help programs like the See Clearly Method, the Power Vision Program and other eye exercise programs promoted online usually claim they can reduce refractive errors such as nearsightedness and astigmatism, as well as presbyopia.

These programs differ from supervised programs of vision therapy prescribed by eye doctors (usually optometrists) to correct certain eye alignment and other binocular vision problems, or to enhance dynamic visual skills for sports vision.

Can Eye Exercises Alter Your Eye's Basic Anatomy?

To better understand if eye exercises that promise "natural vision improvement" can actually reduce refractive errors, you need to consider the eye's basic anatomy and how the eye refracts light.

Problems with how the eye is shaped typically contribute to focusing errors such as nearsightedness, farsightedness (hyperopia) and astigmatism. For example:

When the eyeball is too short, you are farsighted and can't focus on near objects because light rays entering your eye achieve a point of focus somewhere beyond your retina.

When you are nearsighted and your eyeball is too long, light rays have too far to go and "fall short" of achieving a point of focus on your retina.

When you have astigmatism, usually your cornea has an irregular shape. Sometimes, astigmatism results when your eye's natural lens has an irregular shape. These irregularities cause light rays entering your eye to split into different points of focus, creating blurry vision.

Another common vision problem, presbyopia, occurs with aging when your eye's natural lens starts to lose elasticity and no longer can move properly to accommodate focus at multiple distances. This condition typically causes your near vision to start blurring, beginning at around age 40.

When you "exercise" your eyes, you move your eye muscles to create up-and-down, side-to-side or circular motion. You also "work" the muscles controlling back-and-forth movement of your eye's natural lens, to help achieve sight at multiple distances.

So if you are considering an eye exercise program to improve your vision, ask yourself these questions:

Will exercising your eyes change the basic shape of your eyeball, by making it longer or shorter?

Will eye exercises alter the basic shape of your cornea, and change the angle of how light rays enter your eye to achieve focus? (For example, this is how LASIK works to correct common vision errors.)

If you have astigmatism, will exercising your eyes somehow reshape your eye's irregular surface?

If you have presbyopia, will eye exercises restore your eye's lens to its once youthful elasticity that has declined due to aging processes?

A recent review of research published in peer-reviewed, scientific journals conducted by AllAboutVision.com failed to uncover any studies showing that eye exercises can alter the eye's basic anatomy significantly or eliminate presbyopia - which no one escapes after a certain age.

You possibly can "train" your eyes to see better in different ways, such as in how your brain and your eyes adapt and function. Children with certain early vision problems, such as amblyopia or "lazy eye," may need a specific type of vision therapy to make sure their eyes work together properly (binocular vision) and that vision is developing normally.

But above all else, eye shape determines your basic refractive error. And if you have a significant problem with the way your eye is shaped, it's unlikely you will be able to "throw away" your glasses even after a devoted program of eye exercises.

After evaluations of various studies involving programs of eye exercises, biofeedback, muscle relaxation, eye patching and eye massage, officials at the American Academy of Ophthalmology issued this statement in 2004:

"It is not clear if patients purchasing these programs for use at home outside of the controlled environment of a research study will have any improvement in their vision. No evidence was found that visual training has any effect on the progression of myopia. No evidence was found that visual training improves visual function for patients with hyperopia or astigmatism. No evidence was found that visual training improves vision lost through disease processes such as age-related macular degeneration, glaucoma or diabetic retinopathy."

The See Clearly Method of Eye Exercises

The See Clearly Method was developed by four American Vision Institute doctors. AVI licensed the program to Vision Improvement Technologies, which then marketed the See Clearly Method directly to the public.

When the See Clearly Method was being widely promoted, the original website (seeclearlymethod.com) did not include statements regarding scientific proof of the program's effectiveness.

The "tromboning" exercise had you hold a small object at arm's length, inhale, then move the object in to touch the tip of your nose. You would then exhale, look at the object, and move it back out. "Tromboning exercises the focusing mechanism, improves control of the extraocular muscles and stimulates the flow of nutrients inside the eyes," according to the See Clearly Method manual.
However, the website said the do-it-yourself vision improvement plan was a "safe, healthy alternative to glasses, contacts and even laser surgery." But then a disclaimer on the site noted: "The rate at which your eyesight improves as a result of the See Clearly Method and the extent of that improvement, if any, will vary among individuals."

With no way of knowing whether it worked, purchasers bought the product on faith. The Iowa Attorney General's office said the company charged customers about $350 retail for each of the 5,000 to 10,000 kits sold monthly. People wanting to return the kits for a refund reportedly encountered difficulty getting through to a company representative.

The basic version of the See Clearly Method included three videotapes, three audiotapes, an instruction manual, a daily progress chart and other materials. The deluxe version included a CD-ROM.

A fundamental premise of the program was that refractive disorders such as myopia may be partially hereditary but also have environmental causes, such as focusing stress caused by prolonged reading and other near work. Certain eye exercises in the See Clearly Method were designed to relieve "locking up" of the eye's focusing mechanism (a condition called accommodative spasm) from stress and fatigue, thereby reducing the risk for myopia progression and possibly reversing myopia.

Other exercises were said to improve eye coordination or to straighten misaligned eyes. It's important to note that while many people think of such eye exercises as vision therapy, most vision therapists do not advocate or endorse self-directed programs.

The See Clearly Method had you do 30 minutes of exercises a day to strengthen and enhance the flexibility of the muscles that govern the eye's focusing power and control its movements. Six of the activities were described as "new visual habits." One, for example, had you hold a finger up as you varied your focus back and forth from the finger to a distant object.

Then there were 10 "booster techniques," designed to "address problems or encourage faster progress," according to the instruction manual. The "blur reading" technique, for example, had you turn a magazine upside-down at a distance from which the words were blurry. You were then supposed to select a word and run your gaze around it, and if you could pick out any letters, run your gaze around them. Each of the exercises might take two to four minutes. You recorded your progress in the journal that came with the kit.

The instruction manual recommended personal affirmations to help you along. You might remind yourself, for example: "I am seeing better each day." If you were having any doubts, you might declare: "I can see without my glasses," or "I feel positive changes in my vision taking place."

"Visualization" also was a component of the See Clearly Method, along with techniques that were holdovers from an eye exercises regimen called the Bates Method, developed in the 1920s by maverick New York City ophthalmologist William Horatio Bates, MD.

Light therapy, a takeoff on Bates's technique of "sunning," had you sit with your eyes closed and your face six inches from an unshaded 150-watt bulb, just far enough to make your eyes "pleasantly warm but not too hot," according to the manual. Meanwhile, the manual suggested that you "repeat your affirmation and visualize your inner lens becoming more flexible and the muscle more powerful. Visualize the eyeball transforming into a better shape."

The "palming" technique had you close your eyes and rest them against your palms, while "hydrotherapy" had you alternately placing hot- and cold-water-soaked towels against your eyes. Affirmations and visualization were said to help with these techniques as well.

As (or if) your vision improved, you were encouraged to obtain progressively weaker corrective lenses from your eye doctor until you no longer required correction or you enjoyed the maximum improvement. You were advised that patching one eye could be necessary if the fellow eye lagged in its expected improvement.

Do Eye Exercises Work?

A long-standing criticism of eye exercises by optometrists and ophthalmologists is the absence of scientific research that demonstrates eye exercises can effectively reduce or eliminate refractive errors and decrease your need for glasses or contact lenses. The medical literature lacks well-controlled clinical studies - with strict scientific criteria including carefully matched comparison populations - showing that eye exercises effectively treat myopia or hyperopia.

The Scanning Chart exercise was one of the See Clearly Method's 10 "booster techniques." You would position the chart just into your blur zone, then jump from dot to dot in time with the music on the exercise video. The booster techniques were meant to "encourage faster progress," according to the manual.
David W. Muris, OD, one of the four doctors who developed the See Clearly Method, conducted a clinical evaluation of the product in his Sacramento, Calif., practice during the fall of 1999.

"The investors just wanted some due diligence and some people to actually go through this," he said. "They didn't want to require anything scientific."

According to Dr. Muris, the evaluation involved 21 people ages 14 to 80 with mild myopia (less than -3.00 ). After six weeks of eye exercises, nine of the 21 had "significant" improvement and 11 had "moderate" improvement in visual acuity. Seven eliminated their need for glasses or contacts, he said, while 11 had "reduced dependency," meaning they needed their corrective lenses for less time than before.

AllAboutVision.com conducted its own decidedly unscientific evaluation of the See Clearly Method when a staffer gave it a try and experienced no vision improvement. In addition, as a busy working mother of three, she found the minimum of 30 minutes a day the program required too demanding of her time and felt that just wearing her contact lenses was a more reasonable option.

Buyer Beware

Acupressure exercises had you applying firm pressure to specific points surrounding the eyeball. You would press for just a second, then release, and continue this pattern. Basically, it was a massage for the muscles surrounding the eye.
Eye exercise programs occupy a nebulous space somewhere between medical science and folk remedy. Most optometrists and ophthalmologists are dismissive of the types of programs promising that you can "throw away your glasses."

The See Clearly Method's advocates not only acknowledged the unconventional status of the program, but they regarded that position as a virtue.

From the instruction manual, we learned that: "In the history of medicine, new ideas have often been resisted by those schooled in traditional methods." We were told that the decision to wear glasses or contacts - for the present purposes defined as "crutches" - borders on the mentally unsound.

Promotional materials declared: "Certainly, except for diseases and injuries for which there is no cure, nobody in their right mind would willingly accept a condition that compromises the ability to function and enjoy life, or to be dependent on crutches forever."

The number of corrective-lens haters is open to debate, but Levi Meeske, a 25-year-old job-placement counselor in Atlanta, found his contact lenses sufficiently loathsome to give the See Clearly Method a try. Six weeks after starting the program, he was delighted, he said, with his visual improvement. The refractive error in his right eye had improved modestly from -3.25 to -3.00 diopters (D), while his left eye remained stable at -3.75 D.

Meeske still needs contact lenses to correct his vision. "But when they are in, I can see farther - as I'm looking at buildings or at trees, the amount of detail that I'm able to pick up has greatly increased," he said. "Looking at grass, looking at flowers, the colors are much more vibrant."

Keep in mind, however, that the Iowa Attorney General's office found in company records that far more unhappy customers wrote in about their results, and that positive letters were "relatively scarce."

The See Clearly Method was one of the more popular eye exercise programs and was widely advertised. Though it is no longer marketed, similar do-it-yourself vision improvement programs are readily available online.

In fact, a Web search we conducted in 2011 for "eye exercises to improve vision" produced a number of websites promoting such programs - as well as some strange conspiracy theory chatter alleging that optometrists and ophthalmologists know the "truth" about benefits of eye exercises but won't tell their patients because they then wouldn't be able to sell eyeglasses, contact lenses and eye surgery.

Such reckless claims illustrate the importance of considering the credibility of sources when seeking reliable health information on the Web.

While there may be little harm in trying eye exercises to improve your vision, it's wise to keep your expectations in check. We recommend that before you invest time and money in self-help vision improvement programs, first have a comprehensive eye exam and ask your eye doctor for professional advice regarding the effectiveness and safety of any eye exercise programs you are considering.

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eye exercises see clearly method vision therapy myopia nearsightedness natural vision improvement focus focusing eye anatomy convergence insufficiency accommodative insufficiency presbyopia glasses contact lenses eye surgery

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Self-help programs of eye exercises that claim to reduce or eliminate your need for glasses and contacts have been around since the 1920s. But before you spend time and money on anything that promises you will be able to "throw away your glasses," be aware that these programs remain highly controversial and most vision experts contend there is little or no scientific evidence that shows they work.

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Researchers at UC Riverside and Brown University were able to prove through brain-training exercises, that the contrast sensitivity in  vision of 16 older adults improved. I was surprised that 100% of the subjects' vision improved. This study suggests that certain areas of the brain can be strengthened. "It means the visual system has a high degree of plasticity, even in old age," Dr. Andersen said."

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As adults age, vision deteriorates. One common type of decline is in contrast sensitivity, the ability to distinguish gradations of light to dark, making it possible to discern where one object ends and another begins.

When an older adult descends a flight of stairs, for example, she may not tell the edge of one step from the next, so she stumbles. At night, an older driver may squint to see the edge of white road stripes on blacktop. Caught in the glare of headlights, he swerves.

But new research suggests that contrast sensitivity can be improved with brain-training exercises. In a study published last month in Psychological Science, researchers at the University of California, Riverside, and Brown University showed that after just five sessions of behavioral exercises, the vision of 16 people in their 60s and 70s significantly improved.

After the training, the adults could make out edges far better. And when given a standard eye chart, a task that differed from the one they were trained on, they could correctly identify more letters.

"There's an idea out there that everything falls apart as we get older, but even older brains are growing new cells," said Allison B. Sekuler, a professor of psychology, neuroscience and behavior at McMaster University in Ontario, who was not involved in the new study. "You can teach an older brain new tricks."

The training improved contrast sensitivity in 16 young adults in the study as well, although the older subjects showed greater gains. That is partly because the younger ones, college students, already had reasonably healthy vision and there was not as much room for improvement.

Before the training, the vision of each adult, young and older, was assessed. The exercises were fine-tuned at the beginning for each individual so researchers could measure improvements, said Dr. G. John Andersen, the project's senior adviser and a psychology professor at the University of California, Riverside.

During each session, the subjects watched 750 striped images that were rapidly presented on a computer screen with subtle changes in the visual "noise" surrounding them - like snow on a television. The viewer indicated whether the images were rotating clockwise or counterclockwise. The subject would hear a beep for every correct response.

Each session took an hour and a half. The exercises were taxing, although the subjects took frequent breaks. But after five sessions, the subjects had learned to home in more precisely on the images and to filter out the distracting visual noise. After the training, the older adults performed as well as those 40 years younger, before their own training.

The older participants were also better able to make out letters on an eye chart at reading distance, although not one 10 feet away. The younger students were better able to see the distant eye chart, but not the closer one.

"We think that a behavioral intervention where learning is going on changes brain structure in older adults," Dr. Andersen said.

In the absence of a disease like glaucoma or changes in the retina and optic nerve, contrast sensitivity is processed by the brain's visual cortex. This study suggests that certain areas of the brain can be strengthened. "It means the visual system has a high degree of plasticity, even in old age," Dr. Andersen said.

Dr. Andersen and his colleagues, including Denton DeLoss, a graduate student and the paper's lead author, say they do not know how long the effects of this modest intervention will last. But an earlier study in which older adults received training to sharpen their ability to discern texture showed that the improvement was sustained for at least three months.

Dr. Andersen said that as people aged, the random firing of neurons in the brain's visual system increased, creating a kind of internal noise. At the same time, the aging brain struggles harder with external visual noise, such as snowflakes in a blizzard that obscure words on a road sign.

The latest study's exercises were designed to train adults to filter such external visual noise so they could better discern edges of contrast. "It's possible that the brain might simultaneously have been trained to reduce internalized noise," Dr. Andersen said.

Researchers are increasingly focused on perceptual learning, the brain's ability to discriminate among stimuli - training the ear, for example, to distinguish between Shostakovich and Bartok, or the palate to discern a cabernet sauvignon from a pinot noir. There is also much research on the aging brain. But until now, few scientists have thought to examine the possibilities for improving perceptual learning in older adults.

"These researchers are leading the charge," Dr. Sekuler said.

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As adults age, vision deteriorates. One common type of decline is in contrast sensitivity, the ability to distinguish gradations of light to dark, making it possible to discern where one object ends and another begins. When an older adult descends a flight of stairs, for example, she may not tell the edge of one step from the next, so she stumbles.

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The research conducted at UC Riverside and Brown University regarding brain-training exercises, proved that older and younger adults were able to greatly improve their vision through brain-training exercises. I only thought that vision would improve with older adults through medical interventions such as surgery and not through brain-training exercises. "The results of the study indicate that perceptual learning may be a viable intervention for age-related declines in vision. The present study consisted of only 5 days of training, whereas many perceptual-learning studies consist of much longer training periods, in some cases up to 30 days (Karni & Sagi, 1991; Levi, Polatt, & Polat, 1996)."

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Older adults are able to improve their ability to see, through perceptual learning training in a controlled environment at UC Riverside and Brown University. The researchers found that older adults' vision is declined as they age and this experiment proved that older adults have the ability to improve their eyesight with brain-training exercises. "The researchers also found, to their surprise, that the perceptual learning task aimed at improving contrast sensitivity improved visual acuity as well for older and younger adults after only five days of training. The results have major implications for older adults, particularly those over age 65, for whom declines in contrast sensitivity have been associated with greater risk of falls and vehicle crashes."

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Perceptual Training Boosts Contrast Sensitivity for Older Adults

UCR study also produces unexpected improvement in visual acuity

Researchers associated with the lab of psychology professor G. John Andersen have found that older adults whose vision is affected by declining contrast sensitivity can improve their ability to see with perceptual learning training.

RIVERSIDE, Calif. - Older adults whose vision is affected by declining contrast sensitivity - which is a factor in the ability to detect and resolve details in low light - can improve their ability to see with perceptual learning training, according to researchers at the University of California, Riverside and Brown University.

The researchers also found, to their surprise, that the perceptual learning task aimed at improving contrast sensitivity improved visual acuity as well for older and younger adults after only five days of training. The results have major implications for older adults, particularly those over age 65, for whom declines in contrast sensitivity have been associated with greater risk of falls and vehicle crashes.

The study, "Improving Vision Among Older Adults: Behavioral Training to Improve Sight," appears in the online edition of Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science.

Contrast sensitivity is one of the first age-related declines in vision to appear, and numerous studies have suggested the problem may result from changes in the visual cortex of the brain rather than in the eye itself or from disease.

Researchers G. John Andersen, UCR professor of psychology; Denton J. DeLoss, a Ph.D. candidate at UCR and the paper's lead author; and Takeo Watanabe, the Fred M. Seed Professor of Cognitive, Linguistic and Psychological Sciences at Brown University, set out to determine if perceptual learning training could improve contrast sensitivity, possibly by improving processing in the visual cortex.

"This is important because sensitivity to subtle changes in contrast is a significant issue for older individuals, and age-related declines in contrast sensitivity can be critical for many real-life tasks such as driving at night," DeLoss said.

Building on nearly a decade of research in Andersen's Visual Cognition and Human Performance Lab - the primary lab in the U.S. to focus on the use of perceptual learning to counteract age-related declines in vision - the team tested UC Riverside students and individuals age 65 and older using low-contrast stimuli on a computer screen.

Using highly specialized eye-tracking equipment calibrated to each individual in the study, the researchers also measured pupil diameter to determine if allowing more light onto the retina contributed to improvement in vision. Pupil size was found to be related to only a small amount of the improvement seen.

Contrast sensitivity among older adults in the study improved so much that their performance was not statistically different from that of younger adults before training, Andersen said. Both groups experienced significant improvement in visual acuity as well.

"We didn't expect that at all," Andersen said, adding that he was so surprised by the improvement in visual acuity that DeLoss doubled the number of participants in the study to see if the results could be replicated. They were.

DeLoss said that while the team suspected that contrast sensitivity training might produce changes in other aspects of vision, such as acuity, "we did not expect such significant changes in acuity with only five days of training. We found an average improvement of roughly three letters using a standard acuity test. Five letters would be equivalent to moving down a line on a standard chart-based vision test that you typically see at an optometrist's office."

The researchers concluded that "the visual system among older adults is very plastic and has the ability to improve, and that perceptual learning can be used to counteract age-related declines in contrast sensitivity," Andersen said. "These improvements are the result of changes in sensory processing and not due to optical efficiency of the eye."

"We hope that we can continue this line of research in the future and that it will eventually allow us to create interventions that can be used by the general public to counteract age-related declines in vision," DeLoss added.

The research was funded by the National Institute on Aging.

Archived under: Science/Technology, brain, learning, press release, psychology, research, training, vision, visual perception

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Perceptual Training Boosts Contrast Sensitivity for Older Adults

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Older adults whose vision is affected by declining contrast sensitivity - which is a factor in the ability to detect and resolve details in low light - can improve their ability to see with perceptual learning training, according to researchers at UC Riverside and Brown University.