The various devices and techniques available for nonvisual travel may be evaluated in terms of the mobility coverage they provide. However, the coverage provided varies in relation to the function of the device or technique used. The long cane and the various techniques for its use are designed to provide the traveler with object, surface, and foot-placement preview. This article further refines the definition of those functions while specifying each in terms of its measurement.

This article discusses the development of self-report functional outcomes instruments in two years of a three-year large-scale national research project on the rehabilitation of adults with visual impairments. It describes the history of the effort, the process involved, and the methods used in establishing the instruments’ reliability, validity, and responsivity and the results of intermediate analyses of the data.

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The California Psychological Inventory and the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory were administered to 128 women and men, aged 18-55, who were totally blind or partially sighted from birth, infancy, or early childhood, who had no other neurological, perceptual, or sensory-motor difficulties in addition to blindness, and had completed the eighth grade. The significant findings relate to the differences between the sample and sighted reference groups. Although both inventories seem to be highly sensitive to the adjustment patterns of early visually impaired persons, the findings clearly indicate that individual personality test results can be interpreted only when norms are appropriate and based on a representative group of visually impaired persons. Variant CPI and MMPI scale scores may not necessarily reflect psychopathology, but rather may be indicative of the unique adaptive processes of persons who experienced early visual impairment. Since the total experience of congenital or early visual impairment is not easily understood, normative data must be developed so meaningful and relevant comparisons can be made among persons who have shared common developmental experiences.

The Low Vision Clinic at the Veteran Administration's Eastern Blind Rehabilitation Center is using Fresnel press-on prism lenses to aid veterans with extremely restricted visual fields. These prisms optically move objects from areas of visual field loss to areas of useful vision, thereby making objects with a potential hazard more visually accessible. Some of the dynamics involved in the placement of the prisms, training, and adjustment of the client to these lenses are described.