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posted by martyb on Saturday June 09 2018, @06:04AM   Printer-friendly
from the just-need-bigger-books-held-further-away dept.

New research led by scientists at Cardiff University and the University of Bristol found that people who spend more time in education are more likely to develop near-sightedness. Specifically, researchers found that for every year a person spends in education — where they are likely to spend more time reading and typing on computers — there is a rise in myopic refractive error of 0.27 diopters, a diopter being a standard measure of the optical power of a lens. An estimated 68,000 participants were examined using the "Mendelian randomization" (MR), approach which is often used to examine causal effect of a disease in observational studies.

http://www.cardiff.ac.uk/news/view/1199570-study-suggests-education-causes-short-sightedness

https://www.salon.com/2018/06/07/theres-a-scientific-reason-nerds-have-bad-eyesight/


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  • (Score: 5, Insightful) by frojack on Saturday June 09 2018, @06:46AM (9 children)

    by frojack (1554) on Saturday June 09 2018, @06:46AM (#690714) Journal

    It's nothing to do with blue light. It's just due to never focusing on any thing further than 30 feet away. It's a simple exercise issue, not some light induced voodoo that could be solved with blue lenses.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 09 2018, @07:36AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 09 2018, @07:36AM (#690722)

    I believe that, too. But how do we explain astigmatism?

  • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 09 2018, @10:36AM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 09 2018, @10:36AM (#690737)

    The term is "chromatic aberration", which is caused by different colors of light being bent differently by a lens.

    The human eye is supposed to focus perfectly for yellow-green light. There aren't even any "blue" ("S") sensing cells right in the center; that is an illusion provided by the brain.

    The focus difference between blue and non-blue is most likely used as part of a slow years-long sort of autofocus, growing the eyeball to the proper shape.

    • (Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Saturday June 09 2018, @10:49AM

      by maxwell demon (1608) on Saturday June 09 2018, @10:49AM (#690739) Journal

      There aren't even any "blue" ("S") sensing cells right in the center

      Source?

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  • (Score: 3, Informative) by bradley13 on Saturday June 09 2018, @01:05PM

    by bradley13 (3053) on Saturday June 09 2018, @01:05PM (#690775) Homepage Journal

    "It's nothing to do with blue light. It's just due to never focusing on any thing further than 30 feet away."

    In the article I recall, they verified the cause by gluing "sunglasses" onto one eye of some small animal (chicks, I think it was); the glasses reduced the light intake into that eye to indoor levels, and the animals developed myopia in that eye.

    Maybe the constant close focus is a contributing factor as well - it would also tie in to spending more time outdoors. But the short-frequency light apparently really is a major factor.

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  • (Score: 3, Informative) by HiThere on Saturday June 09 2018, @06:42PM

    by HiThere (866) Subscriber Badge on Saturday June 09 2018, @06:42PM (#690887) Journal

    That's plausible, but I haven't encountered a study that showed it was true.

    IIRC the study referred to (I'm assuming it's the same one I read about) tried to control for that, so it didn't address that point. That would take a separate study. I've run across lots of people asserting it, but whenever I checked they were relying on plausibility rather than evidence.

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  • (Score: 2) by wonkey_monkey on Saturday June 09 2018, @07:32PM

    by wonkey_monkey (279) on Saturday June 09 2018, @07:32PM (#690908) Homepage

    It's a simple exercise issue, not some light induced voodoo that could be solved with blue lenses.

    It certainly wouldn't be solved by blue lenses, because blue lenses don't magically add blue light.

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  • (Score: 4, Interesting) by darkfeline on Saturday June 09 2018, @10:34PM

    by darkfeline (1030) on Saturday June 09 2018, @10:34PM (#690946) Homepage

    My personal theory is that it's caused by too much time focusing on close things, e.g. READING. My near sightedness kept getting worse until I stopped wearing my newest prescription glasses.

    Example: A child reads in class. Human eyes were not evolved for extended periods of focusing on tiny things up close, the opposite in fact. The child's eyes deform from the continuous strain and they can no longer see at a distance, but they can read more comfortably. Get corrective lenses. The eyes now again have to strain to read. They deform and can no longer see at a distance, but they can read more comfortably. Get corrective lenses. Repeat until the child's eyes fully develop and no longer deform as easily.

    Solution? Get the kids reading glasses. Humans weren't evolved for discerning fine detail. We use tools for lots of things, like loupe for examining small objects, it's abnormal that we don't use assistive lenses for reading.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 09 2018, @10:36PM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 09 2018, @10:36PM (#690947)

    Oh, the resident jackass that knows jackshit.

    I could begin to explain to you how wrong here in all sentences, but it's just a waste of time and energy.

    • (Score: 2, Funny) by khallow on Sunday June 10 2018, @12:20PM

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Sunday June 10 2018, @12:20PM (#691080) Journal

      I could begin to explain to you how wrong here in all sentences, but it's just a waste of time and energy.

      Thank you for taking our needs into consideration. But we wouldn't be here in the first place, if we cared all that much about our time and energy. So go ahead and reply so that we may be amused!