Adaptation of tonic accommodation to sustained visual tasks in emmetropia and late-onset myopia

The study complements and extends our previous investigation and reports that late-onset myopes (LOM's, N = 15) exhibit differences in adaptation of tonic accommodation (TA) to sustained visual tasks when compared to emmetropes (EMM's, N = 15). Pre- and post-task TA was measured with a modified Canon R-1 objective infra-red optometer under darkroom conditions. Post-task TA was measured immediately after a 10-min counting task and at 1-s intervals over a period of 90 s; the task was located at distances equivalent to 1, 3, and 5 D. The pattern of regression back to the pre-task TA level was used to assess the degree of adaptation generated by the task. The data indicate substantial differences between regression patterns for EMM's and for LOM's which were enhanced as accommodation stimulus levels increased. Using a two-factor split-plot analysis of variance, statistically significant differences between EMM's and LOM's could be attributed to the rates of change of post-task accommodative levels to pre-task TA levels for both the 3 and 5 D tasks.