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Optometry Times editor Kassi Jackson speaks with Valerie Kattouf, OD, FAAO, chief of Lewenson Pediatric and Binocular Vision Service and associate professor at the Illinois College of Optometry, on the effects of digital media on the pediatric population.

This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity:

Kassi Jackson, editor:

Hi everyone, I'm Kassi Jackson with Optometry Times, and I'm joined today by Dr. Valerie Kattouf, chief of Lewenson Pediatric and Binocular Vision Service and associate professor at the Illinois College of Optometry. Thank you for being here. Dr. Kattouf.

Valerie M. Kattouf, OD, FAAO:

Thanks for having me; pleasure to be here.

Jackson:

So let's talk about children's eye health. According to data provided by the World Health Organization, vision impairment and blindness affect 2.2 billion people worldwide, and 90 million of those affected are children. So why is children's eye health so important?

Kattouf:

Well, I think one of the things to consider is that, you know, vision is a primary input. It's an input method that influences a child's learning, their development, their demeanor, their stamina; it has an effect on everything.

And I think sometimes the misconception is that vision is just about clarity. Clarity is just one part of vision; we need the visual system to be functional, we need it to be flexible, and we need it to be efficient. And there's so many parts that go into that.

Jackson:

Digital media can affect pediatric development. How do you define digital media?

Kattouf:

So digital media is pervasive. And in today's world, it's everywhere. So digital media are your phones, it's your tablets, its computers, its TVs, it's the DVD player in the car. It's all of those things. And I really think ifespecially parentswere to look at it and add up the hours, it's much more exposure for your child than you even think.

Jackson:

What type of effect does digital media have on children's visual system specifically, looking at focusing on accommodation?

Kattouf:

When I talked about visual function, we have the focusing system which has to function readily, we have the eye teamingor binocular vision systemthat has to function.

What parents have to realize is, it's really the phones and the tablets and the computers and the hours spent here that we have these near demands, we are up close on things. And to be honest, our bodies weren't meant to do that; our visual system wasn't meant to do that.

We all have a certain amount of focusing powerkids have a lot more than adults it's why when adults reach into their 40s, they need reading glasses, because we lose focusing power over time. So kids ideally have an immensely strong focusing system that should be flexible and efficient. But my goodness, we are just seeing a decrease in that today.

So literally, the focusing system is a muscle and it gets worn down from too much near demand. If you were to walk around with a 10 pound weight in your arm all day long with your bicep curled, your bicep will be tired. It's the same thing. Kids are on these devices excessively, and it wears down their focusing system.

Jackson:

And how is children's biocular vision impacted by digital media?

Kattouf:

Binocular vision is your eye teaming skills; it's how well your eyes work together. So yet another system that has to be efficient and flexible, it gets worn down.

But I think one of the main things to realize is that binocular vision development, it starts in the brain. And there are a lot of neurological concerns that screen-based activities stimulates visual processing a lot more than it does sensory processing.

So all of that development is affected number 1 by how young we started our kids with an extensive use of devices, and then the excessive use of those devices as well.

Whether it's focusing or it's eye teaming, they both get worn down.

Jackson:

And what about ocular motor dysfunction?

Kattouf:

Ocular motor dysfunction is tracking. So that's an issue with tracking, you know, kids who have difficulty reading, focusing with attention, they can have ocular motor or tracking problems.

A lot of screentime doesn't always facilitate great fine motor development, and ocular motor skills or a fine motor skill.

Jackson:

In your expert opinion, in what way does digital media attribute to the development of pediatric myopia?

Kattouf:

So myopia is nearsightedness.

Basically, someone whowithout their glasseshas a difficult time seeing far away; their near vision is usually better, their distance vision is usually more affected. So that's what myopia is.

And myopia is known to progress over time. If you know someone who's nearsighted, their prescription might be -2 the first time ... the next year 3... and it just keeps going up. And that can become pathological over time.

Number 1, it's visually burdensome; you can get holes, breaks, tears in the back of your eye or in your retina. So myopia is something we want to control; we don't want to see that progression.

When you have excess near demands, you are doing close work all the timescreens, tablets, computersthen you get excess accommodation or focusing, that actually increases the length of the eyeball, the axial length of the physical eye, and that increases myopia.

There are truly modifiable behaviors that affect the development of myopia. The more indoor time, the more time on screens.

It's very often an environmental factor that makes myopia progress over time. It's proven statisticallythrough studiesthat the more time kids spend outdoorsthe less near demands they have, often with that, the less myopia develops.

Jackson:

Moving beyond eye functions, what role does digital media play on children's overall development and their self esteem?

Kattouf:

It's been proven that the higher the use, the the greater the early exposure to digital media, it has negative effects on children, it has negative effects on their intellectual development. It has negative effects on their social and emotional development, as well.

I've always said, we've never seen a generation that has had such early exposure to near demands visually. And then what that does for them in all these other areas: the intellect, the social, and the emotional.

There's a lot of different kinds of books and articles and things on these topics, and some have described digital devices as the third party in the parent-child relationship. So it is that highly influential.

And when you develop unhealthy online habits, then you have unhealthy outcomes. And we see that in teens and tweens, the more unhealthy their digital media use is, the more problems we have with anxiety, depression, issues with coping, things like that.

Jackson:

Studies have shown that children with myopia have higher levels of anxiety and depression. Do you think this is connected to the use of digital media?

Kattouf:

That's interesting.

When you go to optometry school, the first year you have everyone in the class raise their hands that are nearsighted, you know, 75% of the class are my myopes and near sighted. Is that because that's how they got exposed to the profession? Or is it because they're great students?

Kids with myopia tend to be type A personalities; they're go-getters, they work hard, they get into things so you have that personality-driven factor.

And then yes, maybe, I mean, we've seen an increase in how rapid myopia is progression over a number of years. And there's no question that the influence of just excessive use of digital devices has influenced it.

It's certainly not the only thing.

Jackson:

Are there steps our audience can take to support and empower children in their overall development?

Kattouf:

I think that's a great question. Healthy digital media habits make a healthy child.

We're not here to say get rid of all this stuff, it's not possibleit's certainly not possible.

I think one thing for parents to understand is the three C's of digital media: you have consumption, you have creation, and you have communication.

Consumption is when you take in things passively. There's no learning: it's video games, it's, you know, Instagram, you know, stuff like that.

Creation is where the learning happens. It's often what they're doing at school, it can be graphic design, it can be making videos, things like that. So that's a good side of it, where digital media has a positive.

And then there's communication, which again, is a little more empty, whether it's texting or FaceTime, or whatever that might be.

And a lot of the best literature says that when you understand that the three C's of media, there's no reason that you shouldn't be able to limit the consumption [and] the communication to just a couple of hours a day for kids.

So often in our exam room, we see the pointed finger of, "I told you, I told you, those things were bad for you," when we talk about the effects that digital media has on vision. But the thing I actually say to the parent is they can't control it.

There's an addictive piece to these devices that is built in and just built into addict these kids. So when parents point at their kids and say, "Get off that thing, get off that thing, get off that thing," there's an addiction. Studies have shown that MRIs light up for drug addicts and gamblers the same way they do for addiction to video games or social media, whatever it might be.

So there's a real piece there where parents have to establish rules, consequences if the rules aren't followed, and implement those in their home to empower the child to have better habits. We can't just tell them to have it, we have to structure it for them.

Jackson:

What do you hope our audience takes home from this discussion? Are there any key takeaways?

Kattouf:

Number 1, just as an optometrist, you know, comprehensive eye exams, full comprehensive eye exams for your children yearly, it's not about your child, just saying that they have blur, because that visual function of the eye team in the eye focusing skills, it's going to really impact their vision, their learning, their attention, their concentration, all those kinds of things. That's number 1.

And number 2, I really hope that parents take back their power. We have really allowed society to dictate to us that kids should have phones at exceptionally young ages, that that's what kids do is be on these devices for hours upon end. The burden that parents feel around that and how difficult it can be in the parent-child relationship, parents have to take back their power; they have to make their rules and they have to implement their rules.

And I think the last thing I'd say is, you know, one of the ways you can do that is the outdoor time is important. It has really shown statistically there's something about the sunlight and dopamine and all those kinds of things that really statistically lowers the impact of myopia over time. And think about it: it's just a way to get them off devices.

Jackson:

Dr. Kattouf, you thank you so much for your time today.

Kattouf:

Thank you.

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The negative effects of digital media on pediatric development - Optometry Times

Ex-security chief alleges Twitter hid flaws in personal data protection

NEW YORK Twitter misled users and federal regulators about glaring weaknesses in its ability to protect personal data, the platforms former security chief claims in whistleblower testimony likely to impact the companys bitter legal battle over Elon Musks takeover bid.

In a complaint filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission and published in part today by The Washington Post and CNN, Peiter Zatko also accuses Twitter of significantly underestimating the number of automated bots on the platform a key element in Musks argument for withdrawing his $44 billion buyout deal.

CNN quotes the disclosure by Zatko as accusing Twitter of negligence, willful ignorance, and threats to national security and democracy.

Zatko, who Twitter says it fired earlier this year for poor performance, warns of obsolete servers, software vulnerable to computer attacks and executives seeking to hide the number of hacking attempts, both to US authorities and to the companys board of directors.

The hacker-turned-executive, who goes by the nickname Mudge, also claims that Twitter prioritizes growing its user base over fighting spam and bots, according to the reports.

In particular, according to The Washington Post, he accuses the platforms boss Parag Agrawal of lying in a tweet in May.

In the tweet, Agrawal says Twitter is strongly incentivized to detect and remove as much spam as we possibly can.

Twitter has dismissed the allegations.

A company spokesperson tells AFP that Zatko was fired in January this year for ineffective leadership and poor performance.

What weve seen so far is a false narrative about Twitter and our privacy and data security practices that is riddled with inconsistencies and inaccuracies and lacks important context, the spokesperson says in a statement.

The opportunistic timing of the allegations appears designed to capture attention and inflict harm on Twitter, its customers and its shareholders, the statement continues.

Security and privacy have long been company-wide priorities at Twitter and will continue to be.

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Zehava Galon beats out Yair Golan to retake control of Meretz party - The Times of Israel

Indian yoga and mystic Sadhguru, who is followed by celebrities, reveals how being blissful means he never fails.

Photo by Esra Bilgin/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

Sadhguru, the yoga master turned social media celebrity with over 8.6 million Instagram followers, says his philosophy is to always feel "blissed out" adding that adopting this mindset might change your feelings about needing a luxurious lifestyle.

"If you misunderstand your lifestyle for life you will always suffer because someone else will always have a better lifestyle than you maybe, or a more exuberant or extravagant lifestyle, and you will always think you are less than them. So life is important, lifestyle doesn't matter," the mystic told CNBC's Dan Murphy.

He believes that too many people confuse the two but that it is important to realize that someone's lifestyle can change at any time and what lifestyle we have is often out of our control.

"It doesn't matter what's the lifestyle. Life is the most precious thing you have, it's the only thing you have," he said. "Whether you wear fine clothes or rags, what does it matter if you are joyful."

Detaching happiness from luxury and wealth is one of the guru's major teachings which he often repeats. Last year, he shared his thoughts around this message on social media, tweeting: "People are dedicated to their lifestyle, not to their life. Once you are dedicated to your lifestyle, you get enslaved to how much you earn."

Sadhguru's philosophy of bliss and contentment also protects him again against failure, he told CNBC.

"I have no such thing as failure in my life, ever. Because I don't suffer anything. Some things we do it well, some things we don't do it well but I am the same within myself," he said.

"I'm a little blissed out all the time so I am OK."

"How I am, within myself, is determined by me, not by what I'm doing, not even the result of what I am doing," Sadhguru said.

The 64-year-old, who is also known as Jagadish "Jaggi" Vasudev, started teaching yoga in India 40 years ago and has since amassed millions of followers around the world.

They turn to him for guidance on spirituality, meditation and the so-called "realm of mysticism." This concept is linked to the ancient yogic idea of the "third eye" that represents enhanced perception and awareness beyond what is physically visible and a state of heightened consciousness.

His fans include celebrities like actor Will Smith, who revealed that he has followed the guru for years as a result of his bestselling self-help book "Inner Engineering: A Yogi's Guide to Joy" and football star Tom Brady, whose podcast once featured Sadhguru. Both Smith and Brady have also featured on Sadhguru's social media and endorsed his work, including his books.

Sadhguru says his teachings and philosophies are solely based on himself and his understanding of his "piece of life," but his followers often think he is talking about them. He believes this is because everyone is built in the same way.

"Fortunately every piece of life, and the whole universe in some way, is the same replica design. Only complexity and sophistication multiplies, but essentially it's the same design."

In 1992, Sadhguru founded the Isha Foundation which runs and supports spiritual, physical and mental wellbeing and environmental initiatives and centers around the world. It has no religious affiliation, in part because the guru associates religion with the search for meaning.

But under his philosophy, "there is no meaning to anything in the universe." Those looking for meaning are not experiencing life, he believes.

"If you experience life for what it is, in a moment of joy, in a moment of love, in a moment of ecstatic experiences you don't look for meaning. Isn't it only when you're depressed you look for meanings, when you're unhappy you look for meanings," Sadhguru told CNBC.

"So I never look for meanings because I am blissed out all the time," he added, relating it back to his approach to life.

Go here to read the rest:
Indian spiritual guru, followed by Will Smith and Tom Brady, has a message for people desperate for a luxury lifestyle - CNBC

Burlington, Ont.Aug. 24, 2022 The City of Burlington, with the expertise of a Certified Wildlife Control Professional, have eliminated the coyote identified by its victims in recent unprovoked attacks on humans in south central Burlington. The City would like to thank the support of the Halton Regional Police Services (HRPS) who were present to ensure public safety and were ready to assist, if needed.

A third recent unprovoked coyote attack on a human was reported to the City yesterday evening. Animal Services staff played a key role in tracking the coyote identified as being responsible for all three attacks.

During the evening, an 18-year-old girl was lying in the grass at the municipal lookout at the end of Market Street, south of Lakeshore Road, when she felt a tug on her hair. She turned to see a coyote which then bit and scratched her leg as she stood up. The girl was taken for medical attention and was released.

The two other recent attacks were also unprovoked but during the day. The first unprovoked attack was on a female adult on the Centennial Multiuse Trail at Seneca Avenue in the morning. The coyote jumped and bit her from behind. The second unprovoked attack was on a 2 year-old toddler seated on a deck in his fenced backyard less than two kilometres east of the first attack. There was no food, small animals or any other activity to attract the coyote. The toddler was also bitten on the back of the neck. Both victims were treated at Joseph Brant Hospital and released.

The attacks are uncharacteristic of coyotes and are the first reported attacks on humans in Burlington.

Municipalities are responsible for taking appropriate actions to manage resident encounters with coyotes and take appropriate action on municipal property. On the rare occasion that a coyote attacks a person, the City has a Council approved protocol in place that is currently being followed to prioritize and deal with the one coyote in question.

Anyone who sees a coyote is encouraged to let the City know by submitting an online report or calling 905-335-3030. Reporting coyote sightings, or potential problems related to overgrown building sites, garbage or someone intentionally or accidentally feeding a coyote, helps the City monitor the location and activity of coyotes in the community.

Burlington is a city where people, nature and businesses thrive. Sign up to learn more about Burlington at burlington.ca/subscribe and follow @CityBurlington on social media.

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City of Burlington has eliminated coyote identified in recent attacks on residents - burlington.ca

As Chinas military and economic power has grown, so has its ambition to shape global norms to suit its priorities. China believes that the UnitedStates currently dominates the international system, and sees growing Western opposition to China as evidence that the current order is now a threat to the continued security of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). As such, Chinas leadership has come to see its ability to reshape the international orderor, at least, to decenter US power within itas essential to the partys future.

Chinas leaders have clearly articulated that they believe that Western countries, and especially the United States, have been able to exert global dominance because they possess what China terms discourse power (): a type of narrative agenda-setting ability focused on reshaping global governance, values, and norms to legitimize and facilitate the expression of state power.

For the CCP, gaining discourse power translates into an ability to increase Chinas geopolitical power by creating consensus around an alternative, China-led international orderone that privileges state sovereignty over civil liberties, and that subordinates human rights to state security. China has identified both the digital realm and the geographic regions of the Global South as arenas of opportunity in advancing its goals and gaining a discourse-power advantage over the United States.

Chinas leadership has been transparent in outlining its goals for both gaining discourse power and implementing a strategy for doing so. Chinese government scholars believe that discourse power comprises two, mutually reinforcing components: the power to speak, or to articulate a coherent vision for the world order, and the power to be heard, or to have audiences have exposure to, and then to buy into, this message. This involves embedding cultural values within a system so that it comes to structure the relations between statesin both subjective terms (such as norms) and objective terms (such as rules and standards). To operationalize its strategies for gaining discourse power, China has embarked on a major restructuring of the party-state to ensure that the CCP Central Committeethe seat of CCP leadership, of which Xi Jinping is the headretains direct oversight over the bodies responsible for carrying out Chinas discourse-power goals.

Chinese official and academic writings also show that the CCP has come to see the digital arena as crucial in its discourse-power strategy, seeing the opportunities brought about by the Fourth Industrial Revolution as offering a chance to disrupt the hegemony of the West. As one Chinese government official wrote in July 2020, technological changes in different periods throughout history not only bring about economic changes, but also affect changes in the global power structure [] The digital economy is prompting a reshuffle, and China has the opportunity to gain a first-mover advantage. Beijing has made clear its intentions to command the digital world, announcing its aims to dominate advanced-technology manufacturing by 2025, to lead in international standards setting by 2035, and to become a cyber superpower by 2050.

As such, China has embarked on a concerted strategy to gain discourse power via the digital domain. It has done so through several mechanisms: by shaping local information ecosystems via social and digital media platforms, by promoting CCP-approved norms for digital governance and Chinese-developed international technical standards, and by offering the physical digital and Internet infrastructure on which these information ecosystems rely at an affordable cost, and with no conditions for how it is used.

China also sees the Global South as potentially more receptive to its norms and governance principles, and as an attractive market for Chinese digital-infrastructure offerings. Chinas external propaganda narratives couch Beijings activities in the digital sphere as ultimately aimed at granting countries more power over the development and direction of their digital economies.

China has promoted the norm of cyber sovereignty ()in Chinas definition, the right of each country to exert total control over the Internet within its bordersin various international organizations, technical standards-setting bodies, and its commercial relations with countries interested in Chinese products and services. In its external propaganda messaging, China often targets audiences with narratives that erode the legitimacy of the liberal democratic framework and that resonate with local experience; for example, in the Global South, Chinese messaging on digital cooperation emphasizes a shared distrust of Western governments or a shared experience as developing (to use Chinas term) countries.

In actuality, however, Chinas strategy is less about a true attempt to make the digital world more inclusive, and more about supporting the Chinese governments leadership goals. While boosting its economic growth and protecting its ability to exert political control domestically are two major goals of Chinas promotion of cyber sovereignty, Beijing sees laying the necessary groundwork for gaining a discourse-power advantage over the West as another key objective. As Adam Segal puts it, cyber sovereignty represents a pushback against the attempted universalization of [Western] norms [regarding privacy, free speech, access to information, and the role of regulation] that has become the default of the current operating system, as well as a reassertion of the priority of governments over non-state actors.

China sees engaging in targeted messaging, and gaining support for its normative framework across various audiences, as better positioning it to gain the discourse power it sees as essential for reshaping the international environment in a way that better facilitates the expression of Chinese power. Additionally, Chinas leaders fundamentally do not believe that the Chinese perspective can be heard unless they can make the soil fertile globally for their message to seed.

As such, Chinas strategy around discourse power should not be understood as an attempt to turn the world into an authoritarian stage. China is clear in emphasizing its agnosticism with regard to the domestic political characteristics of the governments with which it engages. To this end, it is less important to China whether countries support cyber sovereignty because it offers them more freedom in determining their digital futures, or whether governments see support for this approach as an opportunity to clamp down on Internet freedoms. In either case, China gains discourse power by increasing buy-in for its vision of the global digital order, bringing it closer to achieving its aims of gaining a comparative advantage over the West.

Lastly, while China has advanced presence and strategy in standard-setting bodies, normative spaces, the digital information ecosystem, and the provision of physical infrastructure, the Western worlds approach has been more piecemeal and reactive. Notably, China is advancing much of this strategy through the very mechanisms the UnitedStates and its allies created to govern and shape a free, open, secure, and interoperable digital world. Chinese leaders have taken a bet on the Wests overconfidence in its systems and have built a relatively successful strategy of quietly shaping, repurposing, and encircling them to advance Chinas discourse power. Any effort to counter this reshaping, therefore, relies on the democratic world reinvigorating its engagement in these spaces, more clearly defining mutually reinforcing industrial, commercial, and geopolitical strategies, and doubling down on creating a more geographically inclusive, multistakeholder, collaborative system.

Related Experts: Kenton Thibaut, Iain Robertson, Graham Brookie, Emerson T. Brooking, Andy Carvin, Kat Duffy, Rose Jackson, Naima Green-Riley, Tuvia Gering, and Jessica Batke

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Chinese discourse power: Ambitions and reality in the digital domain - Atlantic Council