A 20-year-old mathematics honor student had an auto accident in which
he did not notice the car drifting off the right shoulder. Although he
was not hurt, we are concerned about the recurrent theme of
poor judgement of distance and speed that he has shown.
He has difficulties changing lanes
on the interstate because he doesn't judge his relative speed and
distance accurately, and often approaches stoplights at exceess speed and
stops abruptly (when his parents draw this to his attention he thinks
they're nagging).
He was discovered to have anisometropia at age 5. He was treted for
amblyopia for three years. Presently, the farsighted eye corrects to
20/40; the other is normal. He is unable
to 'get' the new stereoscopic greeting cards, and says he doesn't think
he has binocular vision, though he passed the state driver's eye exams.
He never enjoyed sports, and has difficulty understanding where all the
players area at any one time; in fact, he is somewhat awkward in social
groups. We have regarded him as having a degree of interpersonal
learning disability.
The questions:
Could his differing image sizes, or his amblyopia contribute to his
problem? Although he is not monocular, can his 'binocularity' be better
evaluated? Or is he just a klutzy kind of individual? If so, can that be
more clearly defined and delineated?
Are there people who have special interest in the interactions of
visual perception and kinesthetic (psychomotor) skills? Any ideas
how to improve his driving?
Opinions and comments appreciated.
Quentin A. Fisher, MD
Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care Medicine
Johns Hopkins University
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