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A Survey of Sports Vision Practitioners

Willhoite, Kendra L
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1682007485087934

Abstract Details

2023, Master of Science, Ohio State University, Vision Science.
The purpose of this study was to survey sports vision practitioners to gather information on sports vision practice. The goal was to learn where opportunities are being found within sports vision and the details of practitioners’ preferred practice patterns. Sixty-one sports vision practitioners answered questions on an online survey after providing informed consent. For those who answered the question regarding their profession, 87% were optometrists. The survey included multiple choice questions, along with a table of sports vision related tools. For the multiple choice questions, survey takers were asked questions about practitioner and athletic population demographics, sports vision assessment and training, and optical tints and nutraceuticals. Survey respondents indicated how often they employed each of the tools in the table. The number of responses for the multiple choice questions ranged from 42 to 61 and the number of responses per device in the matrix table range from 47 to 50. Devices in the matrix table were categorized three ways. Firstly, as analog and digital devices. Secondly, as devices that train the visual hardware versus visual software systems. Lastly, the devices were organized in a 4-tier system based on previously proposed hierarchical visual perceptual models. The survey results indicate that sports vision practitioners have found a wide range of opportunities to work with athletes across several sports and age groups as indicated by responses to questions about athletic patient population, characteristics of work with athletes, and about contracts with sports teams. The sports with athletes with whom the survey responders work (most commonly baseball, 71.15%) generally aligns with the published sports vision research, where baseball is the most studied population. There are discrepancies among the level of sport represented by the results of this survey (most commonly high schoolers, 75.4%) and the literature, where collegiate and professional are more commonly researched. Sports vision practitioners place significance in optimizing UV protection and contrast sensitivity by discussing or prescribing sun protection (30% characterize sun protection as very significant), tinted contact lenses (58% prescribe tinted contact lenses at least occasionally), and nutraceuticals for ocular health (Prescribed at least sometimes by 67% of respondents). The survey questions related to device usage were analyzed using the percentage of respondents that indicated they use a device “most of the time” as opposed to “about half of the time” or “rarely/never”. The results indicate preferences for analog devices more than digital (p=0.027; medians: analog= 29.79%, digital=10.2%), hardware training devices more than software (which targets higher order tasks such as attention) (p=0.045; medians: hardware= 29.79%, software=10.42%), and devices that target lower tier visual skills such as vergence, accommodation, and oculomotor skills as opposed to high level eye-hand and peripheral awareness (p=0.078; medians: Level 1: 61.42%; Level 2: 13.43%; Level 3: 31.25%; Level 4:18.37%). The literature suggests that training both hardware and software systems and high and low level visual skills is best for gains in visual and in-game performance measures.
Nicklaus Fogt (Advisor)
Alexandar Andrich (Committee Member)
Nicky Lai (Committee Member)
Aaron Zimmerman (Committee Member)
92 p.
Ophthalmology; Sports Medicine
Survey; practice patterns; visual hardware; visual software; training devices; sports vision; vision training

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Willhoite, K. L. (2023). A Survey of Sports Vision Practitioners [Master's thesis, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1682007485087934

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Willhoite, Kendra. A Survey of Sports Vision Practitioners. 2023. Ohio State University, Master's thesis. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1682007485087934.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Willhoite, Kendra. "A Survey of Sports Vision Practitioners." Master's thesis, Ohio State University, 2023. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1682007485087934

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

osu1682007485087934
362
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This open access ETD is published by The Ohio State University and OhioLINK.