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A growing segment of the workforce wears Progressive Addition Lenses (PAL) to correct for age related loss of eye function. Many of these aging adults work with computer displays in their daily job tasks. There has been little research to determine display placement that best serves this group of workers. A field study was conducted to examine display placement for PAL wearers. Five conditions were examined; 1) using a notebook computer placed on the worksurface, 2) using a notebook computer positioned on a riser stand, with separate keyboard and mouse, and 3-5) using a separate 19 inch LCD display attached to 3 different adjustable mounts, each with separate keyboard and mouse. When PAL wearers could control display distance and height they selected an average distance of 26.8 inches from the eyes, and a height that created an average eye-to-screen angle of 19.6° below eye level. Based upon perceived eye and body comfort and user satisfaction data, external display conditions with adjustable mounts were shown to be the favored solutions and were associated with the least amount of perceived eye and body discomfort. This type of display support design should to be considered when offering PAL wearers' adjustment solutions.

Ergonomic display placement recommendations should be different for computer users wearing multifocal correction for presbyopia. Ergonomic training should emphasize adjusting text size for user comfort.

No abstract

User-selected display placement for young computer users (prepresbyopes) and older computer users with presbyopia, wearing multifocal lens correction, has been observed in field settings, but not while both groups used the same display size or illumination technology. A field study was conducted to examine placement of an 18.5-inch, widescreen LCD display for prepresbyopes and presbyopes using multifocal lens correction. Both groups viewed the 18.5“ display for four days as they performed their usual computer tasks at their workstations. Multifocal wearers selected a display height that was lower than computer users who did not have presbyopia. As a result the eye-to-screen angle for presbyopes was significantly lower than prepresbyopes. The findings potentially affect proper design and selection of adjustable display supports. Measures of gross body posture and text size were also collected. Multifocal wearers did not choose seated postures different from prepresbyopes. Additionally, the majority of both groups viewed text at arc angles smaller than ANSI/HFES 100–2007 and ISO 9241–3 recommendations.