Children who learn to see underwater clearly

We all know that merpeople have always been depicted as seeing clearly underwater without masks or goggles or lenses, which is why it's annoying that if you go au naturel with nothing on your eyes, you can't see clearly.

I've always wondered whether there was some kind of contact-lens you could put on to see clearly underwater, but it seems that maybe people have the ability to see underwater if they can learn a certain relex. The video below is about how some children who freedive from a very young age learn to develop a reflex that allows them to see underwater.

http://youtu.be/YIKm3Pq9U8M

These children start learning at a very young age, I wonder if one can learn this at an older age

Oh my god. Could I be more jealous? I don't think so. That's absolutely amazing. I want a step-by-step tutorial on eHow, stat. ahaha. That's amazing.

So jealous!

Fun fact: People who are extremely short-sighted can see almost normally underwater! Possibly dangerous suggestion, but if you were to wear contact lenses designed for correcting far-sightedness (at a corrective index of at least +1.30), you may be able to see normally underwater. I'm short-sighted, but not enough to completely throw off the distortion that the water causes, so my eyesight (without glasses) above and below water is about the same. :-/

That is interesting.

I used to wear thick glasses for distance, and could see really well under water. After having Lasik done, to correct it, my underwater vision, is blurry now.

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Originally Posted by MerEmma

I want a step-by-step tutorial

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It was a Swedish scientist who discovered this phenomenon. It seems that after she observed the phenomenon in Moken children, she did some experiments with untrained Euopean children to see if they could learn the reflex.

If you go to her homepage ( http://www4.lu.se/vision-group/peopl...ni/anna-gislen ) you can find her scientific articles including the one on experiments training children can be downloaded there.

Oh yeah! This article! My brother told me all about this after my underwater experience of opening my eyes in the ocean. So jealous!

I would assume a lot people who are in cultures that basically live in the water would be able to see well underwater. Maybe not perfectly like these children but better than us. It's true, we adapt to our conditions we live in.

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Originally Posted by Rat-Soup

Fun fact: People who are extremely short-sighted can see almost normally underwater! Possibly dangerous suggestion, but if you were to wear contact lenses designed for correcting far-sightedness (at a corrective index of at least +1.30), you may be able to see normally underwater. I'm short-sighted, but not enough to completely throw off the distortion that the water causes, so my eyesight (without glasses) above and below water is about the same. :-/

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Personally, I have a prescription of -5 and -6 to correct my nearsightedness. I can see okay underwater (according to my tests, not really WELL) without my contacts in, but when I get above water I can't see. So it's a choice between seeing underwater or seeing the clients/kids/etc above water. XP Or wearing glasses out of the water, I guess, but glasses give me headaches.

So cool!!

On a related note, they’ve made full eye contacts that have a layer of air on the inside of the lens, allowing for use for vision underwater! They’ve tested them to 300ft and with competition swimmers- they are safe and stay securely in. Other contacts on the market are not full eye contacts and therefore fall out frequently in the water. He's an article on them: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vau...5502/index.htm I would totally save up for these babies.

Cool! Thanks for posting!

I wish i could do that!!! If you see blurry because your pupil dilates underwater, then to see clearly you would need it to contract... right? So if you looked at a light underwater, would your pupils contract, making you see clearly?

Very cool, Iona! Thanks for posting :)

This is so cool! I would absolutely LOVE to be able to see clearly underwater. Goggles can really be a drag when you are trying to look like a natural mermaid. Also, I find that I can hold my breath longer when I can see in the water (when I put goggles on.) I will probably be looking into trying to learn how to do this now. lol

After seeing this I went on a mad hunt to see what they did in the experiments, and it seems like there's hope for us! (maybe)
From what I read, it says the kids they trained did this for 33 days. They set boards with different sized lines at a certain distance (was not specified I think) and they tried focusing in on them for hours.
It makes sense, it is a muscle that needs exercise. I wish there was more info on it, maybe someone with better research skills should try to look this up X)
I think I might try this whenever I have access to a pool

i am jealous...

I would love to sign up for that training! It would be a dream come true.

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Originally Posted by Nyx

After seeing this I went on a mad hunt to see what they did in the experiments, and it seems like there's hope for us! (maybe)
From what I read, it says the kids they trained did this for 33 days. They set boards with different sized lines at a certain distance (was not specified I think) and they tried focusing in on them for hours.
It makes sense, it is a muscle that needs exercise. I wish there was more info on it, maybe someone with better research skills should try to look this up X)
I think I might try this whenever I have access to a pool

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I hope the training exists very soon. :b

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Originally Posted by Nyx

After seeing this I went on a mad hunt to see what they did in the experiments, and it seems like there's hope for us! (maybe)
From what I read, it says the kids they trained did this for 33 days. They set boards with different sized lines at a certain distance (was not specified I think) and they tried focusing in on them for hours.
It makes sense, it is a muscle that needs exercise. I wish there was more info on it, maybe someone with better research skills should try to look this up X)
I think I might try this whenever I have access to a pool

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Hi Nyx,

I presume you looked at the Methods section of the article "Visual training improves underwater vision in children" from Anna Gislén's website?

She trained for acuity (ability to see fine details) underwater using so-called 100% contrast gratings, or patterns of black & white bars, as shown in the photo

Attachment 8887

More information on how these gratings work can be found at http://psy.mq.edu.au/vision/~peterw/csf.html

She used B&W bar gratings of 1.75, 2.18, 2.49, 2.91, 3.49, 4.36, and 5.82 cycles per degree, which simply means 1.75 to 5.82 bars in each degree on the paper. Note that you can make your own gratings using a laser printer. Now at 50 cm distance from the eye to the paper, 1 degree would cover 0.83 cm horizontally on the paper, so you print gratings with the required number of bars in 0.83 cm.

For taking videos of the eye's reflex, she used a Sony Nightshot camera, which can detect infrared, with a special optical filter that allows only infrared light to reach the camera. She used infrared Light Emitting Diodes (LEDs) to illuminate the eye with infrared light. I found a picture of the camera setup she was using here http://www.wdr.de/tv/quarks/sendungs...en.jsp?pbild=3

Attachment 8888

You can see that it's a Sony consumer-grade video camera in an underwater housing with a ring of infrared LEDs around the lens to illuminate the subject's iris.

All of this could be replicated. I wonder if a project to develop an open source "Learn to see underwater" training program should be started?

@AptaMer
Wow thank you so much for posting this! it's awesome!
I actually only saw a small article that paraphrased the experiment, so I couldn't get the details.
Again thank you for finding this!
It would be amazing if someone duplicated it, a good business too.
Specially for people swimming in the ocean, what with trying to spot different fish while trying to look graceful (goggles don't help the later XD).

I would donate money to it if there were a kickstarter/indiegogo for someone trying to figure out how to do this. :) Maybe someone will! I would if my life were a bit different than it is.

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Originally Posted by MerEmma

I would donate money to it if there were a kickstarter/indiegogo for someone trying to figure out how to do this. :) Maybe someone will! I would if my life were a bit different than it is.

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AMEN! Seriously, though, I wish I had the time to devote to studying this. Maybe in the summer when my apartment pool is open, it's not frigid and I'm not teaching school. Yeah...that whole two weeks. XD

that would be AWESOME. OMG.

Wait, I wonder if Hannah Fraser can see underwater...? She's been swimming her whole life!

I may be remembering wrong (can anyone confirm) but I thought I remembered an interview with her. Someone asked how she could see underwater and she said she couldn't... *goes searching*

Ah, here: http://www.hannahfraser.com/mermaid/...stingyoureyes?

Doesn't chlorine blur your vision underwater? I've only opened my eyes in pools and in the shallow parts of the ocean (when I get taken captive by a wave and end up tumbling, and need to find the surface. :P). In pools I always thought the chlorine had some part in the blurriness, and in the ocean, all the sand is getting kicked around..so would I need to try it in a non-chlorinated pool? Lol I can't go in the ocean past by waist...which is only about 2.5' haha

Or am I just making excuses for my blurry, underwater vision? Hehe

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Originally Posted by sydthefairebrat

Doesn't chlorine blur your vision underwater?

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Actually, I know what's up with that, sydthefairebrat. The reason Anna Gislen could train her subjects in a pool in Sweden is that in Europe they use way less chlorine than they do in Canada & the United States. The chlorine is so strong in US pools, that that's why it can hurt to open your eyes, and you need to use chlorine protector conditioner for your hair. In Eurpean pools you can open your eyes just fine, and the chlorine isn't nearly so bad ofr your skin and hair. I don't know why they use so much chlorine here in North America, but I think it must be too much, because people seem to do just fine not getting bacteria in Europe.

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Originally Posted by Nyx

@AptaMer
I actually only saw a small article that paraphrased the experiment, so I couldn't get the details.

It would be amazing if someone duplicated it, a good business too.
Specially for people swimming in the ocean, what with trying to spot different fish while trying to look graceful (goggles don't help the later XD).

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Hi Nxy,

So that it will be available for all to read what she did, I have attached the scientific article by Anna Gislén that describes how she did the training. The whole recipe is there. Basically she put them in the water looking at finer and fine gratings to determine at what point they couldn't distinguish detail anymore, and as they practiced trying to distinguish finer gratings, they got better at seeing them underwater. She used her infrared camera to record whether they developed the pupil reflex also.

Because of Mernetwork's limit on PDF file size, I had to break the article up into 2 pieces. If you click on both of them and print them out, you can get the whole article that way. I have all her human underwater vision journal papers & can post the others if there is interest.

I have never been able to swim with my eyes closed underwater, they have to be open, i also cannot use goggles they feel weird, i have no problem seeing clearly under water it has always been clear for me, mind you i used to like swimming underwater a lot as a kid, still do.....chlorine does distort a little for me but in general i see quite well underwater......interesting fact of me is that my eyes are extremely photo sensitive, i see better and my eyes are more relaxed at night or in darker areas, i wear strong uv and polarised sun glasses to be able to stand even a normal light, the sun is way to strong and my eyes feel like they are burning (it also makes me sneeze a lot as do bright lights) i dont turn lights on at home because i get a migraine from the light

So, I can do this with my eyes but not underwater lol. And when I'm above water my eyes start focusing and it makes everything blurry like I have no control over it lol.

I think that's really cool. Normally when I'm swimming I locate by sounds that I can hear, but I've found that I can see clearer if I kinda squinch my eyes. Maybe I could figure out how to isolate the muscle in my eyes, like I did with figureing out how to wiggle my ears. Hmmm...

at night, I like to sink to the bottom of my pool and look up. when I really focus, I can pick out constellations from the water

That would be awesome!

It's not the chlorine that burns the eyes, it's the chloramines after the chlorine does it's work. Properly balanced chlorine pools don't smell, and don't burn the eyes.

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Originally Posted by Thalassa

Personally, I have a prescription of -5 and -6 to correct my nearsightedness. I can see okay underwater (according to my tests, not really WELL) without my contacts in, but when I get above water I can't see. So it's a choice between seeing underwater or seeing the clients/kids/etc above water. XP Or wearing glasses out of the water, I guess, but glasses give me headaches.

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Without my glasses, my eyes are -15 and i have bad contrast , but underwater I can see almost perfect <3

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Originally Posted by Ariel Starfish

Without my glasses, my eyes are -15 and i have bad contrast , but underwater I can see almost perfect <3

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Cool. So with a different focus, it is possible for your eyes to see clearly underwater.

In a way, you're the opposite of most people. Most people don't need anything to see above water, and need goggles to see underwater. You don't need anything to see underwater, and need glasses to see above the water. Respect! :hail:

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Originally Posted by Capt Nemo

It's not the chlorine that burns the eyes, it's the chloramines after the chlorine does it's work. Properly balanced chlorine pools don't smell, and don't burn the eyes.

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That's totally cool. I once went to a hotel nearby where one pool burned my eyes like crazy and the other one was perfect; I could see pretty darn well. Almost as well as above.

My sister has really bad eyesight she is -21 in both eyes and when we were little i always wondered why she never bumped into anyone at the pool lol

I'm thinking if you wear hard contact lenses (gas permeables) what's the chance of them falling out of you're eyes in the pool?

Also does anyone know anything about clear scelra lenses and how easy they stay in your eyes hard vs soft (taking into account that some people's eyes reject the lenses regardless)