Dominant Eye – its importance & how to find

Do you know you have a dominant eye? Yes, like everyone have a dominant hand, you have a dominant eye too. You can be left-eyed, right-eyed like you are with your hands, shoulders, or legs. It’s hardwired in your brain which one to give commands first. Just like your hands, how you sub-consciously use your either hands, one of the eyes give you more accurate vision than the other one.

For me, I am right-eyed, like most others. How did I find it? By doing this simple test.

How to find your dominant eye?

1. Stretch out your arms and make a triangle with your hands. 
2. Next, center your hands over a distant object, like a clock on a wall. 
3. Close your left eye and see through the triangle. 
4. Did the position of the clock change?
5. If the position of the clock or the distant object changes, then your left eye is dominant. If not, your right eye is dominant.
6. Now, close your right eye and see through the triangle, and notice if there is any change in the position of the clock. 
7. If the position changes then your right eye is dominant. It stays the same, then your left eye is dominant.
8. If there are no changes then none of your eyes is dominant. It’s not common to have no dominant eye. 

There might be minuscule changes that you are not able to notice. Like the case with ambidextrous people, ambidexterity comes with practice. Usually one is more dominant. Not to brag, I can write with both my hands and my right hand has always been the dominant one.

If you have difficulty determining your dominant eye, you can go for an eye test. They will make you cover your one eye and make you focus on the object. There are other solutions like using a phoropter.

Why is it important to find your dominant eye?

Some profession requires you to know which eye is dominant. Also, it makes it easier for you to do a certain task that needs accuracy. 

Shooting

For instance, if you are a sharpshooter, knowing your dominant eye can make a lot of difference. It will help improve your accuracy. If you are a right-handed person, it is not necessary for you to be right-eyed as well. 

While shooting this will create a difference for your target. Aiming with your right hand and closing your left eye to shoot can make you shoot a distance away from your target. You need to know which one is your dominant eye to aim accurately.

Next time, you go on a date to an amusement park, you can shoot with confidence and win prizes for your date.

Sports

If you are a sports person playing baseball or softball or basketball, you can aim accurately and make goals or baskets or whatever scores for your game. I have zero knowledge of sports, but I do know you need to aim accurately. Your 90 mins gameplay can improve if you can aim accurately, give passes to your teammates accurately and know your opponents position accurately from hindsight.

Do you play carom? If you are betting with your cousins and friends for your next friendly duel, you should prepare your dominant eye. Knowing which eye to shut to aim, can help you win the red carrom.

Photography

If you are a photographer, knowing this is greatly helpful. Nowadays, everyone is a photographer with a digital camera. But they don’t have the knowledge that professional photographers have. You are squinting your eyes like the professionals but your photos are always weird or the object of interest is out of focus. Your dominant eye is missing here. You might be closing your dominant eye while taking the shot. Next time, you are out with your camera, close the eye that is not dominant and use your dominant eye to see through the lenses. This will create a great difference.

What else other than aiming right?

Knowing your dominant eye can be helpful in vision correction surgeries. If you are going for monovision correction, it is usually your dominant eye that requires correction. It is mostly the one that is required to see things in the distance.

In older days, people used to wear monocles, when they needed prescription glasses for only one eye. Knowing this helped in monovision correction. 

Your non-dominant eye is responsible for near-vision. This will be helpful when you have presbyopia, amblyopia (lazy eye), and strabismus.

Amblyopia

Amblyopia is a vision defect mostly occurring in small children. In this, the brain fails in processing inputs from one eye. Over time it favors another eye. To correct this vision defect, the child is given to wear an eye patch over the dominant eye. This helps them in getting used to the vision from the non-dominant eye.

If you live in the UK, then you can take your child to Specscart’s opticians in Bury. You can get your child’s eye tested for amblyopia. Amblyopia is covered under NHS. You can bring your child to our Bury store and get their eye tested.

If Bury is far away from your place, then you can visit our store in Walkden. The opticians in Walkden just like in Bury have experience of more than 20 years. You can visit the store with no worries. If you are not able to take time out of your busy schedule, then you can schedule your eye test at your home free of cost.

Strabismus

In strabismus, you have misaligned eyes. You either have squint eyes (cross-eyed) or lazy eyes (walled-eyes). Both your eyes are either looking inwards or outwards. This can give you distorted vision or double vision.

Inward eyes can be corrected by using glasses or contact lenses. You squint your eyes to focus on closer objects. Wearing glasses for near vision can help. You can buy online glasses from Specscart. We have a wide range of glasses and sunglasses in good style and in high-quality glasses.