We all know whether we are right-handed or left-handed. But only a few of us know whether we are right-eyed or left-eyed. This means that we do not use both our eyes equally. One eye is dominant or stronger than the other. It has been found from several studies that 65% people have an unconscious preference for the right eye, 32% for the left eye and only 3% are ambicular i.e. they use both eyes equally.
By the following experiment, you can know whether you are a right-eyed person or left-eyed.
Hold a pencil in your hand and stretch the arm in front of you at eye level. Keep both your eyes open and line the pencil up with a picture or shelf or some object on the wall. First close one eye and see the object. Then close the second eye and see the object with first. If the object remains lined up with your right eye opened, and seemed to move to the left when your left eye was opened, then your right eye is dominant and if it happens the other way, then you are left-eyed.
There are some other methods too by which the eye dominance can be determined. In this respect, one Stanley Coren conducted some experiments at the University of British Columbia. He concluded that when we see objects with the dominant eye, they appear somewhat bigger. He selected 45 people and tested them for eye dominance. It was found that 25 people were right-eyed and 20 people were left-eyed. It was interesting to note that 17 of the right-eyed subjects viewed the object bigger with their right eyes whereas 13 of the left-eyed persons felt the same difference in size with their left eyes.
According to scientists all individuals have equal refraction for both eyes; the difference in size felt by the right-eyed and left eyed persons was only psychological. It is just a matter of unconscious individual preference practiced from the beginning that leads to the dominance of one particular eye and makes people right-eyed or left-eyed.
