Hi Geoff
Firstly congratulations on all your recent accomplishments and the interest and dedication that you give to queries on the Forum.
An extract from a book entitled Undercover Golf by Joe Borgenicht and R.D. Robinson published by Quirk Books in 2004 (ISBN 1-931686-72-6) prompted me to revisit the issue of eye dominance.
In the section of putting it is stated
P137 "generally right-handed people are left-eye dominant..."
P125 Illustration advocating dominant eye nearest to the hole.
I can't find anything to support the statement that generally right-handed people are left-eye dominant, and can only presume that this is a typing error.
However, the issue of having your dominant eye nearest the hole (target) remains of interest. I re-read your article on Dead-Eye Putting in which you clearly put forward your position. I also re-read the exchange with Stephen Cheng, your response to the article in Golf Digest 1973 by Dr Donald Tieg, and the reference to an article in the Journal of Vision by Tandra Ghose that found that eye dominance shifts from eye to eye depending upon which eye the target is closer to.
You end with the comment that you still believe in the importance of side-dominance (I am not certain what side-dominance actually means) in the setup, but that you are more open to the suggestion about having the dominant eye closer to the target.
Have you had any further thoughts on the relevance of eye dominance once you are over the ball? Since the majority of right-handed golfers are right-eye dominant, are we all sub-optimising our vision of the target, or is the whole thing just splitting hairs?
Kind regards

Dear Neville,

The quest for sorting out which eye is dominant has a "once and for all" absolute character or a "for all occasions" character about it that is misleading. Eye dominance only matters in certain ways in relation to specific uses of the body. More specifically:

From behind the ball: The sense of the "straight ahead" relationship between the ball and the target seen from this perspective is aided by locating your dominant eye on the vertical plane that includes the dominant eye, the ball, and the target. If you hold a putter shaft up into this vertical plane to visually "connect the dots" of ball and target on the straight edge of the shaft, you will find that using only one of the two eyes avoids a double image of the shaft when the eyes are focusing farther off.

Aiming the putterface behind the ball: If you walk into the back of the ball and start positioning the putterhead behind the ball to aim the putter face down the line you perceived or sensed while sighting the line from behind the ball, sometimes eye dominance can matter. It especially seems to matter in this use of the body (aiming the putter face from beside the ball) when the golfer is cross-dominant (e.g., right-handed but left-eye dominant or vice versa). This is where my notion of "sidedness" comes in -- more of which in a moment.

But if you reconstruct your sense of the line using cues on the ground near the ball as identified from behind the ball (and these cues don't go anywhere or change depending upon your position or perspective, since they are physically located on stationary objects such as the ball or the surface), then eye dominance doesn't matter in aiming the putter face. Eye dominance only matter in this use if you are trying to match up the putter face aim with where you perceive the target WHILE STANDING BESIDE THE BALL and using physical motions of the head and eyes to try to gauge the location of the target. In general, I think that sort of re-targeting from beside the ball in order to aim the putter face is a bad idea and generates mistakes in pereption and aiming.

I instead teach that cues to the line should be identified from behind the ball and these cues used to reconstruct that perception of line when moving up to the ball and tryng to aim the putter face. (There may be some "approximate" locating of the target from beside the ball in the early reconstruction of the line in aiming the face, but this tageting is only conditional and tentative.) Only AFTER the putter face has been aimed do I recommend re-targeting from beside the ball, and then the re-argeting is not for locating the target, but for determining where exactly you have aimed the putter face. That happens only after the golfer squares up to the putter face as aimed and uses a reliable physical method to assess where exactly ther putter face is aimed -- and not to try to locate the target from beside the ball. When the assessment of putter face aim indicates that the putter face is truly aimed at the target, THEN you're ready to putt.

From beside the ball: This is the assessment of where the putter face has been aimed based upon the sighting the line and near-ball cues from behind the ball, and not upon walking up to the ball after sighting the line from behind and re-targeting from beside the ball to again find the target. In this putter face assessment, eye dominance doesn't really matter at all. What matters is that the skull line match the putter face aim, the gaze of both eyes is straight out of the face, the head turns on the axis from base of neck out top of head without the axis wandering and only rotating in place, and the spot of the visual field of one of the two eyes thru which the line of sight of a straight-out gaze transits is used like the bead on a gunsight. When this physical procedure is used, the aim spot or gunsight bead starts on the putter sweetspot and gets moved perpendicularly straight away from the putter face along the line the putter face is actually aimed, and whatever location on the surface that arrives at the aim spot or sighting bead at the end of the head turn is where the putter face is really aimed. You can use the aim spot of either eye, but it is just more normal to use the aim spot of the dominant eye.

So eye dominance beside the ball is not that big a deal. The relationship of the face and neck and head to the putter face as aimed is much more important to the accuracy and reliability of perceptions of the true target location.

The only wrinkle is that cross-dominant golfers "feel" better aimed when they setup a little open. That is because eye-dominance is not an isolated phenomenon, but relates to body action in space with reference to other objects in space. This is where the notion of "sidedness" comes in. "Sidedness" as I use the term indicates that the body and brain is reactive to targets in space only in terms of a contemplated action to the target. That is why eye dominance can shift depending upon the size of the target or the side of the body the target is located on -- these studies only confirm what my understanding of the nature of brain-body action suggests is the case anyway. Eye dominance is not really an absolute character of anyone's body -- it is somewhat in flux, more or less so depending upon the individual, their position, and the body action they are engaged in with reference to the target.

In so many words, cross-dominant golfers who "feel" better a little open are partially feeling better because they are also still trying to locate the target from beside the ball rather than assessing putter face aim, and also partially because they are subconsciously / non-consciously practicing their body action to the target. These golfers are really aiming their action, not their putter face, and are "hunting" for the relationship of body to target location that "feels" correct. Standing a little open helps them feel better about this.

This physical procedure for locating the target from beside the ball is simply not as accurate and consistent as the physical procedure used behind the ball. Using a second, flawed physical procedure for targeting from beside the ball that supplants the immediately prior and superior procedure for accurately sensing the target location behind the ball strikes me as manifestly dumb, unelss it is absolutley necessary and can't be avoided. Reconstructing the line with cues near or on the ball and aiming the putter face based on the behind-the-ball targeting procedure, followed by a reliable procedure to check whether the putter face ended up aiming where you hoped to aim it, strikes me as manifestly superior, so re-targeting from beside the ball (trying again to locate the target in space) while aiming the putter face is NOT necessary or unavoidable.

I suppose that one could concoct an accurate physical procedure for locating the target from beside the ball, and then use this WHILE AIMING THE PUTTERFACE, instead of reconstructing the line using cues at or near the ball. But my best guess is that this physical procedure beside the ball would first have to start with assessing accurately the putterface aim, so why do anything else? This check will very often show you that your reconstruction of the line in aiming the putter face was correct, and when it does not, you simply adjust the face (and resquare the body to the new putter face aim) and check again until the error is reduced and vanishes (may take a couple of tries).

In any event, the real cure is NOT to try to locate the target from beside the ball -- leave that to behind the ball plus accurate reconstruction of the behind-the-ball sense of the line when placing the putter face using cues on the ball and ground. If cross-dominant golfers structured their total targeting routine in this way, then their dominance would not matter near as much, and would only matter in the ways outlined above. Then cross-dominant golfers would not cling to their dominance from beside the ball and would setup and stroke the ball out of a squared-up setup.

The accommodation of the eye dominance only really is needed as a bridge or patch to a better system altogether, in which eye dominance doesn't matter much once beside the ball.

Cheers!

Geoff Mangum
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Gentlemen:

I haven't visited this site for two years since my post that your dominant eye should be closer to the hole. Geoff has the benefit of a scientific background, but his explanations are too complicated for my simple mind to understand.

What I do agree with Geoff on is that the best and only way to line up a putt if from behind the ball. Going to the other side or walking in a circle around the ball and the hole is useless. Using Geoff's preferred approach to lining up the putt, you should putt facing the hole, side-saddle (i.e. both eyes perpedicular to the hole) like Sam Snead did in his later years.

I have noticed many women golfers line up their putts from behind and put the putter face down behind the ball (and on the putting surface) perpendicular to the intended line of the putt. They then turn 90 degrees and face the hole sideways. This is a good idea but I rarely see any male golfers do this.

I maintain that by turning your body 90 degrees you get a different view of the hole (and where it is). In other words, you have to re-calibrate your line just before you putt. That is why it is important to have your dominant eye closest to the hole. Othewise your re-calibration of the intended line will be off. It is more important on short putts where a small aiming error may be the difference between success and failure.

I also agree with Geoff when he mentions how Nick Faldo (and many other pros) has his caddy stand immediately behind the ball when Nick has turned sideways (90 degrees) to address the ball. The caddy is just confirming that Nick hasn't changed the face of his putter from the point they decided on when looking at the hole from behind.

Unfortunately most amateurs don't have the luxury of having a caddy confirm that their aim is correct once they have turned 90 degrees and addressed the ball. Some change in the putter face angle relative to the intended line is inevitable. Therefore, the best way for an amateur (without the second set of eyes of a caddy) to correctly line up his putt is (a) from behind; and then (b) putt side-saddle using both eyes (eye dominance is not so relevant); or (c) putt with your shoulders along the intended line, but have his dominant eye closest to the hole.

Since the vast majority of golfers putt either left or right (and hardly anyone putts side-saddle), you must opt for having your dominant eye closest to the hole. That is why you should determine a child's (or beginner's) dominant eye before you decide whether he or she should putt left or right.

Using other cues on the ground etc doesn't make much sense on the 4-6 footers that I say aiming is critical on. On those putts one doesn't usually give the hole away (OK, maybe right edge or one ball outside). You must have the correct aim or else you will miss more often than not. That is the cause of the yips in my opinion (dominant eye away from the hole).

Stephen Cheng