Abnormal Early Visual Experience and Visual Function in Monkeys

Abstract

The relationship between anomalous early visual experience and visual dysfunction has been noted in clinical observations for the past century, and yet it has been only in the past 25 years that experimental manipulation has begun to provide the solid physiological and behavioral data needed for an understanding of the process of visual development. Outstanding amongst the essential animal models for human visual processes has been the Macaque monkey, being demonstrated to be quite comparable to man in visual physiology, anatomy, spectral sensitivity, contrast sensitivity, and binocular functions. Moreover, the sensitivities of young monkeys can be altered by early abnormal visual experience in ways to mimic the consequences often seen in the pediatric eye clinic, thereby qualifying this monkey as the best model for research on the underlying physiological changes associated with abnormal visual experience in early life.