Beneficial effects of spatial remapping for reading with simulated central field loss

Anshul Gupta, Juraj Mesik, Stephen A. Engel, Rebecca Smith, Mark Schatza, Aurélie Calabrèse, Frederik J. Van Kuijk, Arthur G. Erdman, Gordon E. Legge

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

8 Scopus citations

Abstract

PURPOSE. People with central field loss (CFL) lose information in the scotomatous region. Remapping is a method to modify images to present the missing information outside the scotoma. This study tested the hypothesis that remapping improves reading performance for subjects with simulated CFL. METHODS. Circular central scotomas, with diameters ranging from 48 to 168, were simulated in normally sighted subjects using an eye tracker on either a head-mounted display (HMD) (experiments 1, 2) or a traditional monitor (experiment 3). In the three experiments, reading speed was measured for groups of 7, 11, and 13 subjects with and without remapping of text. RESULTS. Remapping increased reading speed in all three experiments. On the traditional monitor, it increased reading speed by 34% (88), 38% (128), and 35% (168). In the two HMD experiments, remapping increased reading speed only for the largest scotoma size, possibly due to latency of updating of the simulated scotoma. CONCLUSIONS. Remapping significantly increased reading speed in simulated CFL subjects. Additional testing should examine the efficacy of remapping for reading and other visual tasks for patients with advanced CFL.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)1105-1112
Number of pages8
JournalInvestigative Ophthalmology and Visual Science
Volume59
Issue number2
DOIs
StatePublished - Feb 2018

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
The authors thank Jacob Sanders for assistance with testing of subjects, and Eric Victorson for his work on the remapping algorithm. The authors also thank the late John Wold of Casper, Wyoming, for encouraging this work initially. Supported by National Institutes of Health Grant EY002934, a Research to Prevent Blindness unrestricted grant to the University of Minnesota, an anonymous benefactor for macular degeneration research, a gift from Rodney and Shari Erickson in memory of Jerry Erickson, and by the Center for Applied and Translational Sensory Science at the University of Minnesota.

Publisher Copyright:
© 2018 The Authors.

Keywords

  • Eye tracking
  • Head mounted display
  • Macular degeneration
  • Remapping
  • Simulated scotoma

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