Visual search contributes to subjective judgment of visual efficiency in older adults
- Published
- Accepted
- Subject Areas
- Epidemiology, Ophthalmology, Psychiatry and Psychology
- Keywords
- visual search, visual acuity, self-report, ocular pathology, trail making test
- Copyright
- © 2014 Setti et al.
- Licence
- This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, reproduction and adaptation in any medium and for any purpose provided that it is properly attributed. For attribution, the original author(s), title, publication source (PeerJ PrePrints) and either DOI or URL of the article must be cited.
- Cite this article
- 2014. Visual search contributes to subjective judgment of visual efficiency in older adults. PeerJ PrePrints 2:e738v1 https://doi.org/10.7287/peerj.preprints.738v1
Abstract
Introduction: The determinant factors that influence self-reported quality of vision have yet to be fully elucidated. This study evaluated a range of contextual information, established psychophysical tests, and in particular, a series of cognitive tests as potentially determinant factors. Materials & Methods: Community dwelling adults (aged 50+) recruited to Wave 1 of The Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing, excluding those registered blind, participated in this study (N=5021). Self-reports of vision were analysed in relation to visual acuity and contrast sensitivity, ocular pathology, visual (Choice Response Time task; Trail Making Test) and global cognition. Contextual factors such as having visited an optometrist and wearing glasses were also considered. Ordinal logistic regression was used to determine univariate and multivariate associations. Results and Discussion: Visual acuity (Odds ratio (OR) =1.71), ocular pathology (cataract, OR=1.78; glaucoma, OR=2.43; ARMD, OR=3.48; other pathologies, OR=2.83), lack of correction (glasses, OR=1.34), poor visual cognition (Trail Making Test, OR= 1.35) were determinant factors for poor versus excellent vision in self-reports. Education, wealth, age, depressive symptoms and general cognitive fitness also contributed to determining self-reported vision. Conclusions: Ocular pathology underlies the presence of visual deficits that are not fully captured by the acuity test. Poor visual search and visual attention skills capture the functional use of vision linked to higher level visual processing. Age, education and wealth, as well as mental health also bias responses. A careful examination of the respective contribution of such factors should be considered when using self-reports to asses vision and its role in cognitive and functional health.
Author Comment
Part of this work was presented at the IGS, Ireland. This is a submission to PeerJ for review.