title: Assessment of visual acuity in infancy and early childhood.
abstract: The forced-choice preferential looking method (FPL) shows the development of acuity during the first year of life, and is applicable to clinical assessment. A tracking test using a narrow strip of grating yields a more sensitive measure for the later part of this age range, however. The development of acuity is dominated by neural rather than optical or accommodative factors. By age 3 years resolution acuity is very close to adult performance, but at 5 years 'crowding' effects may still impair performance on practical acuity tasks more than for the adult.
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D002386:Cataract / Q000151:congenital; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D008297:Male; D012030:Refractive Errors / Q000175:diagnosis*; D014787:Vision Tests / Q000379:methods*; D014792:Visual Acuity