An ophthalmologist shows you how color blind people see the world

Color blindness is linked to a relatively common hereditary genetic anomaly. It concerns men more than women, since 8% of them are affected, compared to 0.5% of women. What is the mechanism that explains this “color blindness” and how color blind people see the world?

How to explain color blindness?

Colored vision results from the perception and combination of three colors, red, green and blue. The combination of these three colors makes it possible to form different shades. So in our eyes, we have cells, called cones, which allow these three colors to be transmitted to our retina.

We therefore have blue, red or green cones. If one of these cell types does not work, we cannot have information about the corresponding color: this is color blindness.

There are three main types:

• Monochromatism, which is rather rare. In this case, the colorblind person will only see in black and white, with shades of gray. This is explained by the total absence of cones;
• Dichromatismthis is when the person perceives green and blue, red and blue or red and green only, due to the presence of 2 types of cones;
• Abnormal trichromatism is an anomaly in the perception of color intensity. The person suffers from difficulty distinguishing certain colors, such as red, green or blue.

Several videos dedicated to color blindness

In a series of videos posted on Instagram, @Docteureye discusses the different types of color blindness. We can see the original images in one corner of the video and the vision of these same images by people suffering from color blindness.

When there is an absence of retinal cones sensitive to red, difficulty perceiving and distinguishing red with “frequent confusion with green” We are talking about “protanopie”. The doctor recalls in particular that this type of color blindness has consequences on daily life, with difficulty in distinguishing traffic lights, in selecting ripe fruit and this leads to professional limitations for professions.requiring color discrimination“.

Other tests may be performed to make the diagnosis of color blindness. To find out more, discover our article “Color blindness: tests to see clearly”.

Slide: Color blindness test: will you be able to recognize the celebrities hiding behind the dots?