Badminton & Vision Correction : Related?

Discussion in 'Chit-Chat' started by wilfredlgf, Jun 21, 2003.

  1. wilfredlgf

    wilfredlgf Regular Member

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    Something about the game of badminton that seems to be played by many people who uses vision correction ie glasses or contacts.

    Most serious or mid-serious players I know wear glasses or contacts :

    1. 4/6 of the top players during my secondary school years.

    2. 3/7 of the 'Friday Guys' of the staff at the office

    3. Spectra ;) oh, badrad, kwun

    I know this is too gross an estimation, so I wonder how many BFers wear glasses as well. :cool:

    Does badminton actually brings negative effects to the eyesight?

    Joke : Then, does badminton qualify as a geek game? :)
     
    #1 wilfredlgf, Jun 21, 2003
    Last edited: Jun 21, 2003
  2. Cheung

    Cheung Moderator

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    Wildfred, your question is, ahem, shortsighted!

    Many people of your locality are from Southern China. For some reason, many of these people wear correction aids for myopic vision.

    I am sure that where you live, many people who play golf, tennis etc and come from the same ethnic origins and also wear eyesight correction aids.

    An association is different from causation.

    If you really want to find out if badminton causes myopia, then you have to consider at which comes first. Do people play badminton first, then wear glasses, or the other way round?

    (Initially, you'll have to prove that there is a higher incidence of badminton players with defective vision with respect to the normal population with consideration of their ethnic origins):)

    As an answer to your joke;) What's your definition of a 'geek'?
     
  3. wilfredlgf

    wilfredlgf Regular Member

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    Thanks for refining the question, Cheung.

    Thus, for this purpose I kept this thread in Chit-Chat instead of General Forums for I know it's more of a coffee shop discussion than serious badminton science... :D

    So, the question should be, "Does badminton bring about eyesight damage?".

    and

    "How many of you began to wear glasses since playing badminton?"

    As for me, mine was contributed by too much reading with bad habits of keeping the books too close, not badminton :)

    geek (gee-ek) :
    A person who is single-minded or accomplished in scientific or technical pursuits but is felt to be socially inept
    [www.dictionary.com]

    Come on, you know what I mean when I said geek - then usual stereotype of socially inept guys with poor eyesight but fabulous brains for science made popular by the American media. Think Steve Erkle. ;)
     
  4. xsleepyaznb0ix

    xsleepyaznb0ix Regular Member

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    I wear glasses. dont think i can see very much if i didnt wear em when i play. but at times im glad im wearing glasses. geez those people who cant aim but got a strong powerful smash that always some how end up really close to your face.
     
  5. Joanne

    Joanne Regular Member

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    I wear glasses too... lol. I'm kinda of a book-worm, so when I was younger I used to lie down and read... bad mistake but it was so comfortable! Come to think of it... I still do it sometimes now too. LOL! Never learnt my lesson, but now I use a pillow to lean on, not lie flat on the bed and read, if you get what I mean. :D
     
  6. Cheung

    Cheung Moderator

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    Since a person needs to interact with other people in order to play a game of badminton, I think the answer to your question is 'no'.:)

    Do you know Chan Chong Ming and Sigit Budiarto wear glasses??

    And are they 'geeks'? Well, I have seen Chan Chong Ming acting very naturally and socially amongst people he didn't know.;)
     
  7. Nanashi

    Nanashi Regular Member

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    no glasses for me... but god do i need a pair....
     
  8. Hugo

    Hugo Regular Member

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    I don't think badminton affects vision in any greater proportion than doing any other sporting activities. I have only began wearing glasses this past school semester because I was unable to see the white board clearly from the back of the classroom. However, when I play badminton, I can do fine without them. I tried playing baddy with glasses on once and noticed that I had great difficulty hitting the shuttle when it came down from high heights because I would see the shuttle from the area of my eyes that was not covered by glasses and then it would suddenly clarify when it passes through the area where the glasses covered my eyes.

    Not only was the shuttle hard to hit but I also got minor headaches from that shuttle transition.
     
  9. LazyBuddy

    LazyBuddy Regular Member

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    Well, weired things happened to me.

    I got all the bad habits about using eyes, like reading under poor light, or bright light; reading on a bus or walking; reading while lying in bed; playing games for hours, etc However, my eyes were still 20/20 (best in us std.)

    One yr, my mom warned me about how to "protect eyes", and forced me to start to do "eye exercises" after hrs of reading/studying. That yr, my eye exam result was not as good as before. She said, "see, all teh bad habits build up these yrs, lucky i told u to correct it, at least, not too late yet."

    Then, somehow I started to get lazy, and went back to my old habits again. Guess what, my eyes got back to 20/20 again!!! And still now... My friends have no explaination about my situation, but just jealous :D

    So, guess I am the exception??? ;)
     
  10. AKFT

    AKFT Regular Member

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    The reason why a person is short sighted is because their eyeballs are shorter than the focal length of the lens, ie the focal point is behind the retina. I am sure this is mainly a genetic trait. All the eye exercises and other voodoo stuff may help a little, but if the focal point mismatch is too much, you would need glasses to correct the focal point.
     
  11. cooler

    cooler Regular Member

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    LB, i think you're lucky. I don't know anybody who does things like u do and still have 20/20 vision. :rolleyes:

    AKFT, i thot short sighted mean the focal point is in front of the retina.
     
  12. Joanne

    Joanne Regular Member

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    Many of my friends don't play badminton with glasses on though... says it affects their playing, uncomfortable. But I HAVE to play with it on because if I don't I'll only see some flying white thing in the air. Lol. ;)
     
  13. wilfredlgf

    wilfredlgf Regular Member

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    Most I know switch to contacts when they play. It can get pretty annoying at times when sweat begin to roll down the glasses when you're playing like mad. Have to stop and wipe, gosh...
     
  14. cooler

    cooler Regular Member

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    contacts have their bad points too.
    1. no eye protection like glasses
    2. Under long MS rallies (wind factor) or lots of cross courts(rapid eyes movements) in MD, my contacts sometime get out of position and i temporary lose my focus in one of my eye. I hate those moments.:mad:
     
  15. chub2003

    chub2003 Regular Member

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    hey at least u never have to worry about getting smashed in the eye...other than that, theres no reason to fear a smash right?
     
  16. yonexfanatic

    yonexfanatic Regular Member

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    well, if u aren't wearing glasses to play, you can always get those sport glasses/goggles to wear if you're afraid of getting hit. yes, that is an advantage of wearing some eye protection, whether it being prescription or not. Overall, I myself wear glasses but not when playing..like others have mentioned, to some people, like myself, it just messes up my timing..i'm sure i'd get used to it if i wore them a few times in a game. Overall, i don't believe playing badminton affects the eye vision...if anything, could it be possible that it sharpens your vision (assuming your vision isn't poor..but quite decent already)..from all those smashes, your eyes must be pretty good to see them, hahah:D ..just joking
     
  17. Californian

    Californian Regular Member

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    I started wearing glasses long before playing badminton.

    If anything, it seems playing badminton would help eyesight.

    I've always wondered how much of a benefit that excellent eyesight would be in playing badminton. In baseball, it is believed that part of the reason Ted Williams was such a great hitter was that he had 20/10 vision, which enabled him to see the rotation of the seams on the pitched ball much better than the average hitter.

    Only if you wear a pocket protector on the court and carry books, floppy disks, and a calculator in your racquet bag.
     
  18. reenignelivic

    reenignelivic Regular Member

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    It is hard to correlate the eye vision problem with playing badminton by finding out whether we had already weared glasses before we played badminton. Assuming most of us play badminton only three hours a day, three days a week, a lot of activities besides playing badminton would more possibly cause eye sight problem.

    I suggest some of us who have at least four children in the family start an experiment. Divide your kids into two groups. One group of children play badminton with you. The other group do something else. Check their eye sight regularly and report the result back here... haha
     
  19. odjn

    odjn Regular Member

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    hmm.....so many problems with glasses and contacts.....maybe yonex should team up with some glasses or contacts company and make some badminton glasses or contacts or something? Hopefully Yonex will make a variety of different styles of glasses, so everyone won't be wearing the same pair of glasses....what a scary thought!:eek:
     
  20. wilfredlgf

    wilfredlgf Regular Member

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    And they'd probably end up as designer shades ala The Matrix. This could be good for tennis, but not badminton though. No one wears shades to play badminton!

    One question : Shuttlecocks are (most of the time) white and bright in colour, could it help if one wears shades to play the game? :D
     

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