eye doninance????

[robbor]

Ok I was just watching Oprah and they said how to tell your eye dominance. I have heard of eye dominance and had issues in the past with blurred vision and headaches from spotting and riflescopes.
I shoot right handed, and am left eye dominant. The past 2-3 years I have been trying to shoot both eyes open, and have done ok. Should I be trying to shoot left handed??? It would probably take me a long time to get used to closing the right eye and leaving the left open, not natural for me at all

 

[jcullen]

Try shooting with both eyes open,or put some frosted scotch tape on the right lens of your shooting glasses and still keep both eyes open.Had the same problem and this worked for me, also stopped watching Oprah.....LOL

 

[rstreich]

Yep, tape on your shooting glasses will do the trick. Put your head down on the scope when you place the tape. It only takes a little bit over just the right spot.

 

[Hipshot]

Robbor,

I'm left eye dominant and spent 45 years shooting right handed and closing my left eye. I count number of boxes of shells per duck felled. I started shooting F class at 300 meters with a local club about 3 years ago. Most of the shooters are 3 position and a few have won medals at nationals, internationals and olympic matches. I tried taping over my left lens, tried a shield on the sights. All that happened was I still did not have a field of view worth anything, couldn't simultaneously see the target and wind flags, and still had headaches. One of the better shooters suggested I shoot left handed. Ha. How do I do that with a right handed rifle? Plus, I'm too old and ornery to change now.

He finally convinced me to try it. F class is prone which is pretty simple to try the switch, no sling, no kneeling, no standing, etc. I moved over to the other side of the rifle. He helped me with my body position. It felt weird.....for about 5 minutes.

I discovered a whole different world out there. I could keep both eyes opened, see if I was shooting on the correct target,usually a good thing), see wind flags I knew were out there, no headaches, plus my left eye is better, so even the target alignment was better. The only strange thing is that I have to work the bolt with my left hand by going over the action to operate it; my right hand stays out front so as not to "break" my position.

We don't have a lot of F class shooters but since switching to left hand shooting, I've never been beaten.

Oh, I recently purchased my first left hand rifle, an Anschutz .22 and have started to work on 3 position shooting. I can now shoot poorly,not awful) in kneeling and standing with the .22.

My strong advice, switch to left handed shooting and a whole new world will appear.

 

[JimmyO]

How do you test for eye dominance?

 

[Forum Boss]

How do you test for eye dominance?

Make the OK sign with your thumb and index finger. Hold that about 2' from your face at eye level. With BOTH EYES OPEN Center the OK on a specific object a few feet away--such as a lamp or wall hanging. Make sure you have the object centered in the circle.

Now, close one eye,while still looking through the ring formed by thumb and index) and note what you see. Repeat with the other eye closed. Whichever is your dominant eye will let you see the object centered. The non-dominant eye will have the object over to one side or the other.

 

[JimmyO]

Thanks,

I'm left-eye when I use my right hand and right-eye when I use my left... hopefully I'll live.

When I was a kid my buddy shot his Benjamin .22 right handed but used his left eye. He always was a bit strange, maybe he was just ahead of his time.

J.

 

[Asa_Yam]

Some numbers I've heard on dominance - not sure if they're correct, but they sound right:

90% of shooters are right eye/right hand dominant.

6% are left eye, left hand dominant

2% are cross dominant.

1% have NO dominance. These are the lucky few - within limits, it doesn't matter which hand or eye they use.

Literature on the subject suggests eye dominance does matter - the US Army did a study back in 1996, and the abstract can be seen at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=9120204&dopt=Abstract

 

[rstreich]

Hmm, where do I fit in here? Right-handed, but no dominant eye. Sigh, always the outcast....

 

[gbp]

lol i guess you don't belong here
i am also right handed but left eyed, but i have been shooting this way for so long it seems to be the only natural way to shoot....really messes people up when they try and shoot one of my rifels though,only to find out that it is left hand stock, and right hand action

 

[robbor]

boy I though this thread was dead, good to see some more active responses. All I did was poke a hole with a pencil in a piece of paper and look for a specific object, before I could cover one eye i realized my left was the one inline. Cover each eye and see if the immage of the object is still in the whole. If you think you are both or neigher eye doninant I suggest you do the test a few times caually and not trying to out think your self. I have only looked into this more because of headaches and blurry vision from more than 2-3 min of spotting or sitting on the rifle at the range for a while. If you are not bothered, then why change? I cant close the right eye and keep the left open but the next time i go out I will try shooting left handed,both open) and also taping over the right lens and see what works for me. I dont think i will find myself shooting right handed with my left eye as that looks to awkward and angeled but very interesting. Ive also seen some rige, probably rail guns with the scope offset, now i know why. As far as I know most stocks,factory) are actially ambidextrus,sp?) but the bolt throw is what is hand specific. Ive also seen some verticle grip stock listed as for both. Its very easy to pick out the ones that are not. Atleast ill always have an excuse for missing:crazy: lol.