Better peripheral vision and reaction times in sign language users
How many times have you tried looking from your peripheral vision? It’s not very clear and you cannot really ascertain what you are seeing. Most of the time, we don’t even react to any stimuli in our peripheral vision.
Peripheral vision is that which occurs outside the centre of our gaze. The density of our retina cells is the lowest around the edges and that’s why human peripheral vison is weak compared to animals.
Human peripheral vision is affected by sensory, developmental and environmental experience.
In deaf individuals, lack of hearing brings about unique sensory and cognitive changes with previous studies showing that deaf adults have a peripheral visual advantage.
But most deaf people also use spatial languages such as the British Sign Language (BSL) to communicate which in itself places visuospatial demand on cognition which is quite different from spoken language, as deaf individuals are typically focused on the face of the person signing to them.
Signed language is thus likely to stimulate peripheral vision, according to the scientists behind this study.
This study shows that people who use BSL have better reaction times in their peripheral vision and a positive impact on visual field response.
To test effect of deafness and the use of visuo-spatial language on peripheral visual processing, researchers measured visual reaction times (RTs) and response accuracy to visual stimuli.
43 participants from three groups – deaf group, hearing group and BSL interpreter group – were presented with vision tasks to detect static, briefly illuminated LEDs, presented to the far visual periphery.
The findings revealed that BSL interpreters displayed faster RTs than hearing non-signing adults. BSL interpreters have not necessarily been using BSL since childhood but have shown improved peripheral visual sensitivity by learning this language and using it daily.
Deaf adults demonstrated significantly faster RTs than both hearing non-signers and hearing BSL interpreters, showing that deaf people have the best reaction times and peripheral vision which now scientifically supports the belief that losing one of your senses can enhance others.
This study shows that learning a visual-spatial language such as BSL has a positive effect on peripheral vision and visual field response which can be highly beneficial in sports and while driving, according to the scientists.
With those kinds of benefits improving your peripheral vision might be a great idea and one way to do it is to become a BSL interpreter.
Source: Frontiers in Psychology
