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Refusal to look

CliveC

My son is 5, and he refuses to look. Not just at people in the eye, but at anything. If you ask him to find the blue block, his eyes won't go to the blocks. He just chooses a block without looking, at random. If he's trying to put on his trousers and he gets stuck, he won't look to see what the problem is; he just keeps pulling and then gives up. He won't use his eyes to take in information and learn. And frankly, without that, he's pretty much going to stay where he is. He can repeat back chunks of dialogue from Chuggington (although barey comprehensibly), but he can't learn from what he sees because he hasn't made the connection between looking and learning. Any suggestions?

  • This is a really thoughtful response and opens up a whole lot of possibilities that I had not considered. I'm not sure how easy it will be to diagnose which if any of these he's suffering from, but they are certainly avenues to explore with his pediatrician and optometrists. He wears glasses, but one of them is plain glass while the other is for acute myopia. So there is a real imbalance there, and maybe that is causing some issues with targetting or 3-D images. He recognises people very well, but that doesn't mean he's not suffering from some form of Agnosia. And he may indeed be having Sensory Integration problems. His focus on the TV when he's watching Chuggington or Thomas is exclusive and all-absorbing. It's really hard to interrupt his concentration. He even reaches for food without looking where his plate is or what's on it! Anyway, lots to think about – thank you!

    Clive

  • Hi Clive,

    I think that this is a problem that definitely needs looking into professionally, if only because there are several possible explanations.  Please note that I'm not a trained professional, this is just what I have learned from amateur research into the subject - large pinch of salt required!

    From my reading, several possibilities come to mind...

    - Physiological.  This could be an eyesight problem, or a physical difficulty with training his eyes at a specific target, making proper "3D" vision difficult for him, or leading him to see confusing double-images.

    - Agnosia.  This is a general category that takes many forms.  Eyesight and targetting work fine, but the brain does not process the images properly in order to recognise the objects purely from visual information.  For example, in the form called Prosopagnosia, the patient cannot recognise people's faces, even of very close family members.

    - Sensory Integration.  This is something that I struggle with personally.  If information is coming from several senses at once, it can overwhelm my brain, and I have to concentrate on "decoding" one sense at a time. For example, the touch sensation of being stuck putting his trousers on, might "override" your son's ability to process what he is seeing.

    I'm sure this list is far from exhaustive - it is just to give you a sense of the variety of difficulties that could result in the same behaviour that is visible to you.  Definitely one to speak with your GP or son's key-worker about - a well trained Occupational Therapist etc. would be able to determine the cause, and help you find an appropriate course of action.

    Best wishes.