Effects of chronic alcoholism in the sensitivity to luminance contrast in vertical sinusoidal gratings

• Autor(a) principal: Cruz,Éllen Dias Nicácio da
• Data de Publicação: 2016
• Outros Autores: Andrade,Michael Jackson Oliveira de, Cavalcanti-Gaudino,Melyssa Kellyane, Nogueira,Renata Maria Toscano Barreto Lyra, Santos,Natanael Antonio dos
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Psicologia (Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul. Online)
• Texto Completo: http://old.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0102-79722016000105106
• topic: Alcoholism; Spatial vision; Visual contrast

Abstract The aim of this study was to measure visual contrast sensitivity (CS) of luminance using vertical sinusoidal gratings with spatial frequencies of 0.6, 2.5, 5.0 and 20.0 cycles per degree of visual angle in chronic alcoholics in abstinence period. The participants were 20 volunteers (26–59 years of age) divided into two groups: the study group (SG) consisted of 10 volunteers with a clinical history of chronic alcoholism abstinence and the control group (CG) consisted of 10 healthy volunteers. Each group had five female and five male participants. All participants had normal or corrected visual acuity and were free of identifiable diseases. The psychophysical method of forced choice between two temporal alternatives (2AFC) was used to measure visual CS of luminance of 41.2 cd/m2. The results showed significant differences between groups for all spatial frequencies tested (p< 0.001). These results suggest alterations in the visual perception related to chronic alcohol consumption even after years of abstinence.