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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Psychol.
Sec. Perception Science
Volume 15 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1494964
This article is part of the Research Topic Visual Perception and Mental Imagery in Aging, Health and Disease View all articles

Understanding Contrast Perception in Amblyopia: A Psychophysical Analysis of the ON and OFF Visual Pathways

Provisionally accepted
Junhan Wei Junhan Wei 1,2Ziyun Cheng Ziyun Cheng 1Deying Kong Deying Kong 3Wenman Lin Wenman Lin 1Robert Hess Robert Hess 4Jiawei Zhou Jiawei Zhou 1*Alexandre Reynaud Alexandre Reynaud 4
  • 1 National Engineering Research Center of Ophthalmology and Optometry, Wenzhou Medical University, Wenzhou, China
  • 2 Shaanxi Eye Hospital, Xi’an People’s Hospital, Xi’an, China
  • 3 The First Affiliated Hospital of Xi'an Jiaotong University, Xi'an, Shaanxi, China
  • 4 Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences, McGill Vision Research, McGill University, Montréal, Canada

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    The study aimed to explore potential discrepancies in contrast sensitivity in the ON and OFF visual pathways among individuals with amblyopia compared to controls.: Eleven adult amblyopes (26.2 ± 4.4 [SD] years old) and ten controls (24.6 ± 0.8 years old) with normal or corrected to normal visual acuity (logMAR VA ≤ 0) participated in this study. Using the quick contrast sensitivity function (qCSF) algorithm, we measured balanced CSF which would stimulate the ON and OFF pathways unselectively, and CSFs for increments and decrements that would selectively stimulate the ON and OFF visual pathways. Contrast sensitivity and area under log contrast sensitivity function were extracted for statistical analysis.Results: For the balanced CSF, we found significant interocular differences in sensitivity and area under log contrast sensitivity function in both amblyopes (F [1,10] = 74.992, p < 0.001) and controls (F [1,9] = 35.6, p < 0.001), while such differences were more pronounced in amblyopes than in controls. For increment and decrement CSFs, we found that the increment sensitivity (p = 0.038) and area under log contrast sensitivity function (p = 0.001) were significantly lower than the decrement in the amblyopic eye. Such differences between increment and decrement CSFs were not observed in the fellow eye of the amblyopes or in the controls.There is a subtle difference in the contrast sensitivity of the amblyopic eye when exposed to stimulation in the ON and OFF pathways.

    Keywords: Amblyopia, Contrast sensitive function(CSF), qCSF, ON and OFF channels, Contrast perception

    Received: 11 Sep 2024; Accepted: 07 Oct 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Wei, Cheng, Kong, Lin, Hess, Zhou and Reynaud. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Jiawei Zhou, National Engineering Research Center of Ophthalmology and Optometry, Wenzhou Medical University, Wenzhou, China

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