When you were little , your mom probably told you not to sit too close to the video , lest you irreparably harm your vision . But you could file away this democratic warning in the myth file , mighty next to " your grimace will get stick that way"—in realness , sitting closely to the TV wo n’t hurt your eyes . So why do parent the public over still say this to their kids ? Because there was actually a very brief period of time where sitting close to the TVcoulddamage your heart — at least , if you have a General Electric TV in the late sixties .
In 1967 , General Electricinformed the publicthat many of their coloring boob tube were let loose excessive x - ray of light due to a “ factory error . " wellness official at the sentence estimated that the amount of radiation coming from these bad idiot box was about 10 to 100,000 time high than the rate considered acceptable . They recommended keeping shaver a good distance off — but as long as you were a few feet off and did n’t watch TV for more than an time of day at a time or so at penny-pinching range of a function , you were plausibly o.k. . General Electric recalled all of the defective video and fixed the problem by set up a leaded glass shield around the thermionic valve , making up closelipped and personal video viewing safe once again .
" It ’s not an old wives ' tale ; it ’s an old engineering tale , " Dr. Norman Saffra , the chair of ophthalmology at Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn , told theNew York Times . “Based on the world our grandmothers lived and grew up in , it was an appropriate passport . "
At bad , sitting overly close to the television these years will give you a worry and possible asthenopia . This can sometimes be a problem for tike , who often watch TV while lying on the storey ; looking up at the boob tube this way causes more eyestrain than looking straight at the TV or down at it . ( The same utilize for figurer monitors . ) Eyestrain can also pass off when ascertain television receiver or looking at a computer screen where the swooning level of the CRT screen is very dissimilar than the tripping level of the fence in environment . Thankfully , asthenopia is n’t permanently negative , and is very well-heeled to fix — just take a break from watching television .
