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Visual Processing Disorders in Children
Because we do not know what another person sees, problems that affect visual clarity, visual perception, and visual organization are not only difficult to recognize at times, but also difficult to describe to others.
Children are particularly difficult to diagnose because they may have no gold standard of vision with which to compare. In the old Paul Newman movie, The Color of Money, Eddie Felson is perplexed about why he's experiencing a slow deterioration in his ability to play pool. Then he makes the sudden realization that his vision is to blame. It's not that he can't see completely. Rather it's a loss of sharpness, a loss of depth perception, and it affects how he visual plans and monitors what his performance.
Visual processing disorders in children are particularly difficult to figure out because they are not all-or-none, so children do not act as if they were blind. Rather, they may miss visual details, avoid visual busy or moving areas, miss visual social cues (interrupt) and have poor writing and hand-eye coordination. It's hard to be coordinated your hands and eyes when your eyes are giving unreliable or partial information.
Visual behaviors may include (but are not limited to):
- 'Careless' mistakes
- Sloppy handwriting
- Reading Avoidance or Fatigue
- Line or word skips while reading
- Poor eye contact
- Visual Distractibility / 'Inattention'
- Missed Social Cues, Interrupting Conversations
- R-L Confusion, Mirror Reversals
- Avoidance or Poor Performance with Sports
- 'Spacey', Tendency to Become Lost, Not Know What's
- Going On
- 'Clumsy' child, bump into things, easily hurt
- Forgets what's been shown
- Repeated spelling errors, different spellings same word
Children at risk for visual processing disorders include: children with a family history of vision problems (including near-sightedness, far-sightedness, amblyopia) or dyslexia, lazy eye, birth stress, NICU hospitalization or premature birth, diagnosis of non-verbal learning disability or autism spectrum disorder,
Many types of visual processing problems can improve with specific practice, glasses or therapeutic interventions, and in some cases, time. We recommend that initial evaluations involve a Fellow of the COVD, or College of Optometrists in Vision Development, and a child's doctor. If a child's vision problem occurs in association with other learning or neurological issues, other professionals are often helpful.
Parents and professionals should be aware that brain-based or central causes of visual impairment are more commonly assessed in adults than children. Despite remarkable advances in our understanding of how different people 'see' and organize visual information, there are many children whose visual or visual processing issues are missed.
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