October.7.2024

What should we do now for light sensitive learners?

By Wendy Johnson

A paradigm shift from medical model to social model of disability seems to have occurred – and nowhere is that more apparent than in the many responses to the Royal Commission on Disability. This shift adds impetus to the provision of adjustments for those I describe in my book, Light Sensitive Learners: Unveiling Policy Inaction, Marginalisation and Discrimination.  These are “light sensitive learners.” 

Under the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA), students experiencing visual stress and a sensitivity to lighting may be given a coloured overlay (which reduces white paper glare and filters the spectrum); access to natural lighting and/ or a personal lamp. 

Teachers have an obligation to provide such adjustments, wrote former NSW Minister for Education Adrian Piccoli in a letter to the MP for Ballina in 2014. However, many teachers don’t know about these obligations, and little, if anything, about light sensitivity and appropriate adjustments. 

If lighting causes visual strain, then the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Workplace Guidelines suggests:

Anti-glare filters for computer screens to relieve eye strain, fatigue, headaches and stress. Place blinds on windows. Flicker free lighting. Full spectrum lighting. Light filters for covering fluorescent lighting. Lower wattage overhead lights, task lighting or other alternative lighting. Large print. Coloured Paper.

Adjustments for light sensitivity are not new. Teachers in the USA ‘led the charge’ in 1908 because they wanted something done about the dazzle of white paper which made it difficult to read. Thanks to them, a ‘glarimeter’ was developed. School principal A. W. Ray argued in 1938 that artificial lighting was an “educational” problem because it made reading difficult. He worked out that “adequate spectral quality …is essential … for … seeing”. 

That was the era when fluorescent lighting was promoted by General Electric and people started complaining about visual stress. By 1929, palliative light spectrum filtering (coloured) lenses had become common in NSW. Then they were forgotten.

Governments did nothing about the spectral qualities of lighting. But, half a century later, entrepreneurs (a school psychologist and a professor of psychology) promoted light spectrum filtering lenses again. Ophthalmologists reacted and claimed light spectrum filters are just  a placebo!  But visual perception lies within the discipline of psychology and not ophthalmology and the NHMRC is recommending light filters for overhead artificial illumination!  

 The spectral quality of artificial lighting in schools is still a problem. White paper is whiter because manufacturers have added fluorescent dye as a marketing strategy. Those who prescribe palliative light spectrum filtering (coloured) lenses compete for business. Many people can’t afford light spectrum filtering lenses, even if they know about them.

But teachers can, and ought to, provide adjustments for light sensitive learners. Why? Think about visual perception, a dynamic interactive process between light/eye/brain. Changing lighting changes visual perception. Visual perception impacts on most daily activities, including driving, playing sport and – reading. How could it not? This light sensitivity/visual perceptual problem is not just about reading, but reading is what most teachers, parents and researchers are interested in.

Teachers, along with parents, picked up the baton for light sensitive learners in the late 1980s at Alstonville High School in NSW and  developed a policy for them (the only one in the world, to my knowledge and I write about this in my book). Academic results improved. Students told us that light spectrum filters or coloured paper take “the glare away and [take] away the movement [of words] quite a bit”. Some professionals don’t believe them. They say that schools should use evidence, but a student’s experience is not the type of evidence they want so they don’t ask for it.

No one picked up the baton and ran with it throughout Australia. No one ran with it throughout the world. Why not? There are several reasons including –  vested interests! What are those vested interests? The lighting industry, the remedial reading industry, and the coloured lens industry.

The lighting industry is not accountable to any government. The Australian Standards authority in conjunction with the New Zealand Standards Authority (AS/NZ) has total control. More lights, more money and– who cares about spectral quality?

Some people in the remedial reading industry disparage coloured lenses. They are not ‘Magic Glasses’– they don’t cure dyslexia or learning disabilities. But, the problem is not dyslexia, and it’s not a problem with learning, it’s a problem with light sensitivity and visual perception. However, if light sensitivity and visual perceptual anomalies were acknowledged, the need for remedial reading might drop and that would reduce profit. So they would say that wouldn’t they?   

The global coloured lens market in 2022 is valued at USD 5403.28 million” and growing. Allegedly, there’s a “surge of eye disorders”. That’s good for ophthalmic professionals but, as Ray discovered back in 1938, artificial lighting was the problem, not his eyes. A significant number of six-year-old children in Sydney, experienced symptoms of “eye strain”, but researchers demonstrated in 2006 that “the vast majority had normal eye examinations”. Is light sensitivity their problem? 

If teachers do nothing, the consequences for light sensitive learners include reduced academic results; visual fatigue, headaches, and lowered self esteem. A cumulative effect may be inattention and poor behaviour. Moreover, compliance with the DDA is mandatory. 

Begin to shift attitudinal and environmental barriers by asking, “Would you like me to turn the lights off?”

Wendy Johnson PhD  negotiated inclusion of the term “learning differently” in the Australian Disability Discrimination Act when working as a secondary school teacher. She has also worked as a tutor and lecturer in the tertiary sector but is now an independent public policy scholar and advocate for light sensitive people.


Republish this article for free, online or in print, under Creative Commons licence.

4 thoughts on “What should we do now for light sensitive learners?

  1. Simon Crook says:

    Thank you for the article Wendy. I remember when blue plastic filters were all the rage then dismissed as yet another pseudoscientific fad, like learning styles. Light is scientific, including intensity, different frequencies and fluorescence. Human response to light is scientific. Scientific evidence is scientific. Please can you elaborate on the science. Is this light sensitivity Irlen Syndrome as described by ophthalmologists r? If so, the burden of proof that the colour lenses work is on proponents such as yourself, whether it is “psychological” or not. Please can you point us to the evidence base that this is indeed an issue for learning and not just a placebo effect. If the evidence is there then this is an important message to get out there. If it is not there and has in fact been disproven then it is equally important that we quash any such fallacies.

  2. Wendy Johnson says:

    Thank you Simon for your comment. Policy action for light sensitive people entails firstly, acknowledgment of their existence. Secondly, the provision of adjustments which may include coloured paper; exemption from artificial lighting; filters for overhead lighting; provision of reader/writer and audio books. Such adjustments are within the scope of educators. Provision of light spectrum filtering lenses (LSFL) involves a different (health) portfolio, and lighting standards are a multi-national issue.

    Light filtering overlays (which reduce luminance of the page by a factor of about two) and/or LSFL are commonly regarded as placebos for reading failure rather than as strategies for coping with light sensitivity. LSF appear to ameliorate visual perceptual anomalies. For example, a year 12 student “Joe” told me that he perceives words on the page circling continuously. When he wears LSFL, the words still circle but “just go into slow motion”. Could you measure the speed of circling words with and without LSFL? When “Joe” was provided a reader/writer he zoomed from last in the cohort to 23rd; that’s what made the difference to his academic results. What people perceive can neither be proven nor disproven. I argue that quashing students like “Joe” who report visual perceptual anomalies is a clear case of epistemic injustice. Furthermore, I am a proponent of, and have acted as, a reader/writer for students in primary, secondary and tertiary sectors who needed such assistance even though they also wore LSFL.

    A visual perceptual scientist, S. J. Loew has collated “Objective Data: Research using fMRI analysis; Research using Eye- tracking analysis; Research using Genetic/DNA analysis.

    Your comments on my book would be most welcome.

  3. Simon Crook says:

    Thanks Wendy. To your points: acknowledgement of existence requires evidence (the burden of proof). Should this evidence (to an acceptable standard) be repeatable and reproducable, then yes, provision of adjustments should occur, otherwise, they should not. As much as I’m sure Joe is a real person, this is anecdotal evidence and doesn’t meet the threshold. All we’re asking for is robust evidence. Loew would appear to be a quack – he appears to be a senior proponent of Irlen syndrome (or scotopic sensitivity syndrome), which funnily enough is not supported by scientific evidence. It is described as a health fraud taking advantage of vulnerable people https://doi.org/10.1590%2F0004-282X20190014. This nonsense needs to be called out.

  4. Wendy Johnson says:

    Simon, thank you for your continued engagement in this important topic. I call out and document the politics behind this issue in my book. I also discuss the role of research paradigms. “Paradigms cannot be tested. Furthermore, scientists adhering to one paradigm may not approve of, or even understand, a different framework. Challenging a dominant paradigm may be painful … Scientists with rival theories see different things, or don’t see some things at all… Wilkins et al refer to “Visual Stress” which is a subjective experience for which there is no direct measure although there is “objective evidence of neurological subjective experience”.

    Simon, would you suggest that Professor Wilkins is also a “quack”? Are you suggesting that adjustments recommended by the National Health and Medical Research Council (filters on lighting, coloured paper etc) should not be provided? This is an important topic, which is why I researched policy inaction for people with anomalous visual perception.

    [I can send you a list of research articles by several scholars collated by Stephen John Loew, BSc(Hons), PhD(Biomedical] if you wish, and with his permission.]

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