Do Optical Immaturities Account for the Early Limitations in Human Spatial Vision?
Bibliographic record
Abstract
During early infancy, spatial vision is very immature and infants possess relatively high levels of spherical (primarily hyperopic) and astigmatic refractive error. Although optical error is the primary contributor to impaired spatial vision in adults and older children, the role that “front end” immaturities play in infantile visual limitations has yet to be quantified. In the present study, we employ newly developed refractive technology to measure refractive error and visual acuity in individual infants, children, and adults. Left eyes from 6-mo-old (n=28) and 12-mo-old (n=30) infants were refracted twice with the Welch-Allyn SureSight autorefractor (without cycloplegia), and assessed with the Teller acuity cards. For comparison, 3-4-yr-old preschoolers (n=56), 7–8 yr-old children (n=44), and young adults (n= 59) were refracted, and acuity assessed (uncorrected) with either Snellen letters (adults and children) or LEA symbols (preschoolers). Calculations of total absolute refractive error[ |Sph| + |Cyl| ], spherical equivalent, and other linear models of aggregate refractive error all revealed consistent results: Levels of visual acuity in adults and children were predicted well from the magnitude of uncorrected refractive error (all r > 0.59, all p < 0.01). However, neither 6- nor 12-mo-old infants showed any relationship between acuity and refractive error (range or r = −0.08 to 0.06). This is the first study to provide systematic developmental data on the relationship between spatial vision and refractive error from infancy to adulthood. In adults, older children, and preschoolers, spatial vision is predicted well by optical factors. Conversely, almost none of the variation in visual acuity among individual infants is accounted for by differences in optics. This supports current neurological and psychophysical models of visual development which propose that early spatial vision is constrained almost entirely by photoreceptoral and neural immaturities. Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.001 | 0.006 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".