Vision is an area which to a great extent remains outside the realm of treatment by natural and autogenic methods. The orthodox means is by medical and surgical intervention or by mechanical and optical aids. At the turn or the century, William Bates, an orthodox ophthalmologist, recognized that emotional factors piety a significant role in some visual problems. He devised a system of relaxation and movement techniques to promote better functioning of the eyes and their related parts, which in turn ameliorated structural deviations which had come about through change in functioning. Bates’ relaxation procedures were of course a combination of psychological and physical measures, which did for the eyes what Jacobson’s relaxation suggestions (46), and others did for the entire muscular, vascular, ant nervous systems.

In recent years the Bates system of eye training has lost ground. There are now few qualified practitioners of the method available, since optometrists in many states have influenced their legislatures to pass laws making such practices illegal, except by qualified optometrists or medical doctors.

Despite its lowered legal status, the Bates system has merit as tar as it goes. Its chief weakness is that it fails to effect lasting visual improvements in people with longstanding basic anxieties, which the method does not touch. Nevertheless, it serves to correct certain common deviations in visual functioning which are not caused by pathological processes or abnormal growths. there it fails, the writer believes that psychotherapeutic intervention is necessary. A combination of two sates’ techniques and psychotherapy may in many cases be the treatment of choice.

The writer was qualified as a Bates teacher in 1949 by the American Association for Eye Training, of Los Angeles, Seattle, and New York City. This croup was an offshoot of the Corbett Bates School of Los Angeles, which evolved from the Bates group that operated in New York in the early 1900’s. As a result of legal problems its work has largely been discontinued. Today, several brave persons still teach variations of the Bates eye training system with a considerable degree of success.

As a former practitioner of the method, I became deeply interested in the unsuccessful cases, which are constantly referred to by physicians as proof that the work is ineffective.

I was also fortunate enough to encounter a great psychological teacher, Frederick S. Pearls, the Father of Gestalt Psychotherapy, who became my mentor and friend. After working with me to improve his myopic right eye and amblyopic left eye, Dr. Pearls added to the Bates technique and the Gestalt approach sore refinements of his own, evolved from his sight difficulties. Under his profound influence, I became keenly aware of the link between emotional factors and visual processes, and was convinced that here lay the explanation of the unsuccessful Bates cases. It was these experiences which led me to become a psychologist and Gestalt psychotherapist.

The findings of my doctoral dissertation (1966), a study of some pertinent personality aspects of myopes and hyperopes compared with normal sighted, supports the theory that psychological factors correlate with the visual handicaps of these people. I now see more clearly that the common refractory visual anomalies and many binocular (fusion) difficulties are mainly expressions of personality disturbances. The individual who becomes near-sighted, far sighted, astigmatic, has a crossed eye, lazy eye, or strained eyes is expressing his difficulty in functioning as a whole person. He generally feels he dare not see or be seen, or so compensates by straining and staring in such a manner that eventually the visual structures are distorted and impaired. The theory here posited is that the nearsighted (myopic) eye is elongated because of severe tension resulting from basic anxiety expressed in this pattern. That is, the individual who is myopic is usually (unbeknown to him) pushing out and deforming his eyes. The findings in my dissertation and in Kelley’s study (1958) have statistically disproved every other theory usually cited, as the cause of myopia and hyperopia, e.g., inheritance, bad reading habits, nutrition, faulty use, etc.

My study also supports the theory that improvement in vision correlates with ego strength. Therefore it is reasonable to assume that the failures in Bates’ work can be regarded as the result of faulty ego functioning; i.e., the individual does not feel safe enough to give up his defensive processes, which manifest themselves in the visual disturbance as well as in a series of other covert or overt expressions being part of the total process of how the person functions.

To facilitate improvement in visual processes the writer believes that those whose vision fails to improve with Bates’ work alone should be treated with psychotherapy, either alone or in combination with the eye training. Because of its emphasis on total body awareness and functioning, Gestalt psychotherapy has been an effective approach to ameliorating some visual anomalies.
For most people without adequate psychotherapy, basic anxieties tend to persist so that the Bates techniques in themselves result in only transient improvement, or none at all.

The Bates system is an invaluable method which can be likened to other physical approaches readily used and becoming more widely appreciated. But for long term improvement in visual functioning a combination of Bates procedures and Gestalt psychotherapy is recommended.

References:

Jacobsen, E, You Must Relax (rev. ed.) Garden City: Blue Ribbon Books, 1946.

Kelley, C. R. The Psychological Factors in Myopia. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, New School for Social Research, New York, 1958.

Rosanes, M. B., Psychological Correlates to Myopia Compared to Hyperopia and Emmetropia. Unpublished Ph. D. dissertation, Yeshiva Unic=versity, NewYork, 1966.A New Look at Eye Training