I asked my optometrist about "wrong" eye dominance and they brushed it off. Should I find someone else?
Hello,
I've taken up shooting as a hobby about 6 months ago and I've had some difficulties with my left eye being dominant as a right-handed person. I'm looking to get into competitive matches at some point and I'm quite certain this will put me at a disadvantage.
I went in for an eye exam recently and asked my new optometrist about this. They brushed it off saying that I'm not shooting most of the time so I shouldn't worry about it. Is this a reasonable answer? Is it difficult enough to affect a change in eye dominance that I should just give up?
P.S.
Per some advise I've read around the internet, I've been wearing an "off-eye" sticker (https://www.amazon.com/Birchwood-43461-Off-Eye-Optical-Assorted/dp/B06XFZQS1C) on my left lens from time to time in hopes that it might at least even out the dominance of my left eye against the right. I don't know if there's actually any efficacy to this approach. I seem to be able to shoot better with my right eye than when I started, but I feel like I may very well just be imagining that.
Posted Nov 16, 2020, 12:32 AM UTC
You can't change eye dominance at this point and there's not much more to be said about it. Hand dominance is not related to eye dominance. If you think itll affect your performance, patch your left eye while you shoot.
Perhaps not neurologically, nor physiologically, but as a shooter, there is a significant connection. Those with "cross eye dominance" or "wrong eye dominance" (as referred to by those in the shooting community; I'm not using these terms as medical diagnoses) often have significant difficulty with double vision and other problems when shooting with their dominant hand. So much so, in fact, that the military sometimes trains similarly afflicted people to shoot with their non-dominant hand. For what it's worth, my concern is being a better shooter. I don't care what that means from a medical perspective as long as I'm able to perform.
In my search results, I've seen this position represented about 50/50 as compared to people saying that one can change, or otherwise affect, eye dominance via training or other methods. I'm completely willing to agree that the quality of the sources is not not necessarily equal. Is terminology part of the disconnect here? For example, might some of these shooters be making some other change which makes it easier for them to quickly acquire a sight picture?
When considering this, my first thought went to cases where people wore eyeglasses which inverted their vision and eventually adapted quite well (e.g.: https://www.theguardian.com/education/2012/nov/12/improbable-research-seeing-upside-down). Similarly, I've heard stories in the news of neuroplasticity and how people have recovered from strokes after major damage had occurred in the brain.
Oh I know. Hence the comment about patching your dominant eye. Regarding that article you linked, they adapted to the upside down vision. This does not mean that their inverted vision was right side up to them. It was still upside down, they just got used to doing activities like that.
Eye dominance is determined by connections made in the brain. The brain basically allots a certain number of nerves to one eye and the rest to the other. This happens during your developmental years and if you're shooting a gun, you're probably past that stage. Unless you're in texas I guess... there is a bit of plasticity but eye dominance isn't really going to change barring anything major happening to your eyes/brain