MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Kristine Dalton PhD FAAO, FBCLA School of Optometry & Vision Science University of Waterloo Waterloo, Canada MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Dynamic visual acuity refers to the ability to detect and perceive small details in objects that are moving relative to an observer.  Dynamic visual acuity is a complex visual function, that involves a number of different aspects of vision, including detecting the target, moving the eyes appropriately to observe the target, and processing the visual information from the target in the brain to interpret what we are seeing.   What makes dynamic visual acuity so interesting to study, is that as a visual function, it appears to play an important role in a number of real-world situations, including playing sports, driving, and piloting, and it may provide us more information about how the visual system is functioning compared to the more traditional, static vision tests alone. Previous research has demonstrated that consumption of caffeine has been shown to benefit physiological, psychomotor, and cognitive performance.  More recently there has been an increased interest in studying the impacts of caffeine on the vision system, however the impact of caffeine on dynamic visual acuity has not been studied.  This study was designed to address this limitation in the literature, particularly because dynamic visual acuity appears to be such an important visual function for real-world activities.   (more…)