Vision and safety

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 33786, 7 March 1975, Page 4

Vision and safety

Whether drivers should be given more rigorous eye-tests before getting a licence was discussed at a special conference in Britain recently, but evidence that has been collected so far seems to show that drivers with poor vision usually compensate by taking more care.

During the British conference, several speakers said that accidents were caused by bad eyesight and that there should be more tasting, but no evidence was offered to .substantiate this view.

Most of the research which has been done on the subject has been done in the United- States, where a survey of 17,000 drivers showed that the frequency of accidents correlated with good vision rather than bad vision. This, in the view of the research workers, suggested that those .with bad eyesight took more car%.

It was also concluded that there we.s no evidenceto show that eye defects in drivers had an effect on road accidents. The researchers said that drivers with vision defects, of which they were aware, were usually careful drivers. The real culprits, they said, were those with normal vision who did not pay visual attention to their driving, and whose’ judgment and ability were impaired by other factors

— such as alcohol or mental attitude. In those countries where extensive vision screening has been adopted there has been no apparent reduction in accident rates. Indeed, at the British symposium, Dr Ivan Brown, of the Medical Research Council's applied psychology unit at Cambridge. emphasised that it wa.s “the brain behind the eyes rather than the eyes themselves” which really mattered.

Several. interesting facts emerged at the meeting. Il was shown that special night-driving glasses, polarizing ler.ies, and windscreens that were heat-ab-sorbent or had sprayed-on tints were never beneficial and usually harmful, especially by delaying the recovery time after over-ex-posure to glare.

Some speakers suggested that, ?,s well as regular checks on centra] vision, drivers should have their visual fields? and even night vision assessed.

But a three-yearly check on all drivers would not disclose sudden major impairmentstbl field which alone might be. dangerous (people with long-standing fie'ld-ibssfts learn to compensate by frequent eye movements), and the testing of night blindness, even if this were found to

be a factor in accidents, was a tedious and complicated undertaking which would be impracticable on a national scale, it was decided.