Should myopic students wear eyeglasses?―A regression-discontinuity analysis

Huang, Juerong; Chen, Qihui

doi:10.1080/13504851.2022.2094322

Cited by 2 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 13 publications

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“…Even though the estimates of the three effects discussed above ( Table 3 ) are robust in relation to the inclusion of the set of personal and family characteristics, one might still be concerned about the potential existence of other confounding factors that may drive the myopia–depression relationship. Since being myopic is likely to affect students’ daily activities [ 9 ], this subsection further examines the potential influence of students’ time spent on various activities, including sleeping, outdoor activities/sports, watching television and surfing the Internet/playing video games.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…If so, the actual myopia–depression relationship may depend on the proportion of children who adopted vision-correction measures in the study sample. Recent studies have shown that wearing eyeglasses not only enhances myopic students’ academic performance [ 1 , 4 , 10 , 11 , 24 ] but also leads to improvements in mental health [ 5 ] and behavioral changes [ 9 ]. Given a non-trivial proportion of myopic students in China who are reluctant to wear eyeglasses [ 3 , 10 ] (—nearly 30% in our data), the potential mediating effect of wearing eyeglasses is certainly worth investigating.…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Worse still, compared with non-myopic students, myopic students face more socializing barriers (e.g., being victims of teasing, social isolation and violence), which, together with poor school performance, may lead to increased stress, anxiety and frustration among the latter [ 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 ]. Yet, compared with educational outcomes [ 9 , 10 , 11 ], myopic students’ mental health problems have received much less attention.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Besides quantifying the myopia–depression relationship, this study pays particular attention to the role wearing eyeglasses plays in mediating this relationship. Wearing eyeglasses is proven to be an effective vision-correction method and has been shown to help improve children’s education and health outcomes [ 1 , 4 , 5 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 24 , 25 ]. As such, wearing eyeglasses may offset the adverse effects of myopia to some extent.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 3 more Smart Citations

Myopia and Depression among Middle School Students in China—Is There a Mediating Role for Wearing Eyeglasses?

Huang

Dang

Cai

et al. 2022

IJERPH

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Compared with non-myopic students, myopic students face more barriers to learning (e.g., inability to see the blackboard clearly) and socializing (e.g., being victims of teasing, social exclusion and violence), which may lead to increased stress, anxiety and frustration. The high prevalence of myopia and depression among school-age children naturally raises a question of great policy relevance: are myopic students more vulnerable to mental health problems such as depression? This paper sheds some light on this question by analyzing data from the China Education Panel Survey, a large-scale survey of China’s middle school students. Our analysis first quantifies the association between myopia and sample students’ depression status (measured by the widely adopted CES-D scale) adjusted for potential confounding factors. We then explore whether the myopia–depression relationship is mediated by wearing eyeglasses, a cost-effective means of vision correction. Based on data on 19,299 middle school students, our analysis reveals that myopic students scored 0.12 standard deviations higher on the CES-D scale than their non-myopic counterparts. The adverse effect of myopia is more severe for relatively disadvantaged students: older students (who are more likely to suffer from both myopia and depression), lower-performing students and students from poorer families. Further medication analysis shows that wearing eyeglasses suppresses the myopia–depression relationship but cannot completely offset the adverse effect of myopia.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%