Neurological Visual Impairment

10 NVI Characteristics

Color Preference

• The preference for or ability to only see a specific color
• Usually a color that has been present in a child's life (what color their favorite toy/object is)
• Common colors for color preference are red and yellow
• Preferred color becomes a visual anchor for highlighting information and selecting educational materials
• The object should be the preferred color, not the background when presenting materials

Need for Movement

• Visual attention is drawn to items that move
• Some may not be able to see something until it moves
• Drawn to objects that have the appearance of movement (mylar, shiny objects)
• Some individuals move their bodies to create the movement needed to see

Visual Latency

• A delay between an object's presentation and when it is looked at
• May increase when ill, stressed, or tired
• Warm-up activities can help decrease latency
• Provide verbal information prior to presenting an item and keep silent while waiting for visual attention

Visual field preferences

• Most often have a preference for a peripheral field (to the side)
• Most have a lower visual field loss that affects safe travel

Difficulties with visual complexity (4 different areas)

• Complexity of patterns on the surface of objects
• May only look at objects of a single color at first
• Then moving on to 2 colored objects with one of the colors being their preferred color
• Chosen objects can gradually increase in complexity with more colors and patterns
• Complexity of visual array
  • May only be able to visually focus on one item at a time
  • Difficulty with clutter
  • Have a single color-black or white background is helpful
• Complexity of human faces
  • May not be able to look into faces or only familiar faces when they're not talking
  • May appear to look through someone rather than at
• Complexity of sensory environment
  • Some may only be able to attend to one sense at a time (vision, hearing, tactual)
  • Lowering background noise is always helpful

Need for light

• Prolonged periods of gazing at natural or artificial light
• Uses a visually neutral "time out" to rest or use another sense (hearing, touch)
• Light can be used to draw and keep attention (light box, ipad)

Difficulty with distance viewing

• Seems to be nearsighted
• Linked to complexity of array- the closer an object is, the more the background is covered

Atypical visual reflexes

• Absence or delayed blink reflex when touched on the bridge of the nose
• Absence or delayed blink to a visual threat coming toward the eyes at midline
• There is no intervention for this characteristics, it is an indicator of overall visual ability

Difficulty with visual novelty

• Prefer to view objects that are familiar
• New objects need to be taught and should have similar characteristics to familiar objects

Absence of visually guided reach

• May look at an object, then look away while reaching
• May be able to look and reach with single color object and high contrast, but then not be able to do a visually guided reach with a more complex item on a more complex background