Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Can sitting too close to the tv make you go blind?

I don't know if I've posted about this one before or not.  If I haven't, I've been meaning to, since this one is an oldie but goodie.  Anyway, the short answer is one we've all suspected since we were little kids, being chastised with this warning by our overprotective parents... sitting too close to the TV will NOT cause you to go blind.  Keeping your eyes too close to your tv screen, however (or your computer screen, or portable media players, video gaming devices, or even books, whatever those are), can cause you to become nearsighted (as the muscles that help your eyes to focus gradually lose their ability to adjust for things that are far away, see here if you don't believe me).  As a corollary to this, a new study shows that Americans are much more likely to be nearsighted today than 40 years ago (here for the journal's webpage).  I knew I should have gone to optometry school!  Maybe I will just buy some stock in Bausch and Lomb.

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