Near work has been considered to be a potential risk factor for the onset of myopia, but with inadequate evidence. Chinese adolescents use digital devices for near work, such as study and entertainment purposes, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. In this study, we investigated the influence of prolonged periods of near work on accommodative response, accommodative microfluctuations (AMFs), and pupil diameter between juvenile subjects of myopia and emmetropia. Sixty juveniles (30 myopes and 30 emmetropes) were recruited for the study. Participants were instructed to play a video game on a tablet PC at a distance of 33.3 cm for 40 min. Accommodative response and pupil diameter were measured with an open-field infrared refractometer in High-speed mode. Parameters of the subjects were measured once every 10 min, and analyzed by one-way repeated measure ANOVA for variation tendency. There were no significant differences between emmetropia and myopia groups with respect to age and sex (p > 0.05). The low-frequency component (LFC) of myopia gradually increased with time, reached a peak at 30 min, and then declined (p = 0.043). The high-frequency component (HFC) of myopia also reached a peak at 30 min (p = 0.036). Nevertheless, there was no significant difference in the LFC (p = 0.171) or HFC (p = 0.278) of the emmetropia group at each time point. There was no significant difference in the mean and standard deviation of the accommodative response and pupil diameter both in emmetropic and myopic juveniles. Compared with juvenile emmetropes, myopes exhibit an unstable tendency in their accommodation system for prolonged near work at a certain time point. Accommodative microfluctuations may be a sensitive, objective indicator of fatigue under sustained near work in juvenile myopes.
Keywords: asthenopia; digital screen; juvenile; myopia; sustained near work.