Ethnicity plays role in vision problems.

• Position: Eyesight - Brief Article

Ethnicity appears to be associated with children's vision problems--such as near- and farsightedness--suggest researchers from Ohio State University, Columbus. They found that Asian-American youngsters tend to be myopic, or nearsighted, more than their Hispanic African-American, and white peers while white children present with hyperopia, or farsightedness, with greater frequency than those from other ethnic groups. Astigmatism--an irregular curvature of the cornea that causes blurry vision--was most prevalent among Hispanic youth.

"We don't really know why these differences exist," says Karla Zadnik an associate professor of optometry. "It's probably like most of our modern conditions and diseases--a mix of nature and nurture and factors that interact together. But uncorrected vision [difficulties] are a major public health problem, and a large number of children are visually handicapped in their everyday classroom recreational, and other activities."

Nearly one out of five...