When children's eyes begin to change. Change in eye color in newborns

Hello! I decided to start my article today with a description of a small comical situation.

Imagine that this long-awaited moment has come and a child is born in the family. The first visitors began to enter the maternity hospital, everyone comes to congratulate their mother. One of the grandmothers rejoices most of all: “Oh, how he looks like me, the same blue eyes, the same round face.” However, after a few months or even six months, grandfather may begin to rejoice, because the color of the eyes will change, and the face may no longer be so round, but will slowly begin to stretch. And most of all, dad or mom can be happy after three years, when the color of the eyes is finally established and the child begins to form a character that will be exactly the same as that of one of the parents.

A familiar situation, isn't it. It will be a mistake to judge who a child looks like from the first days of his birth, especially if you focus on eye color. After all, most babies are born with one eye color, and after a while they change it.

Reasons why eyes change color

Have you ever heard the word "melanin". If not, then let me try to formulate the term in a more understandable language.

Melanin is a pigment that is released in the human body under the influence of light and helps protect the body from sunlight. It also affects eye and skin color. The more melanin in the body, the darker the skin.

Fair-skinned people burn very well in the sun. You probably often met people with blond hair and pale skin on the beaches, they also, as a rule, have blue eyes. Such people, after a few hours in the sun, turn pink, and the next morning they will have pain, the whole body will burn. All this is due to the fact that little melanin is produced in the body.

What does newborns have to do with this whole story?- You can tell me. The fact is that this pigment is not produced in the womb and, as soon as a child is born, his eyes are not affected by melanin. Very often the color of such eyes is blue. And then, under the influence of light, this color begins to change.

However, there is no such axiom that all children must change color. If one of the parents has blue eyes, then it is likely that the child will remain so. Sometimes children are born with brown eyes, quite often this color cannot be interrupted by anything, only the shade can become a little darker.

When do children start changing eye color?

There is no specific date. Not a single doctor will tell you, “In so many months, your child’s eye color will change, wait!” No, this will not happen. It directly depends on genetics.

Changing the shade of eye color is a rather long-term process that can drag on not only for several months, but also for a couple of years.

Often, parents notice that the shade of the eye in babies changes in six months, plus or minus one month. Sometimes in children, even at two months old, the color already changes, this is especially noticeable if the eyes are brown, they can darken significantly.

Finally, the color of the eyes settles down at 2-3 years, there are cases when this happened even at 7 years.

If your baby’s eye color has not changed at all, this is not some kind of pathology, you don’t even need to get a doctor with these questions, he won’t tell you anything specific, because everything is individual and affects the change in eye color:

• The amount of light;
• Diseases that the child suffers, especially infectious ones, such as severe influenza;
• Psychological factors such as family environment, stress, etc.

Some curious facts

A little lower I will provide you with a scheme for an approximate calculation of the color of the eyes of the unborn child with percentages of probability (here's how I wrapped it). This will be a video:

All, dear friends, in this article I tried to explain to you a rather complex topic in simple terms and I hope that I succeeded.

Newborn babies have the same eye color regardless of the parent's eye color, but the color may change with age. Why this happens and when the color of the eyes in children changes, we will find out in this article.

The reasons

The color of the eyes in newborns of any gender and nation is the same, it is gray-blue with a cloudy tint and of different brightness. It is the absence of melanin that gives cloudiness. But during the first years of life, the color of the eyes will change due to the staining of the iris with melanin. When a child is just born, he has little of this pigment in his body, and with age it accumulates and stains the iris.

When the eyes of children turn into a permanent color and how much melanin is formed, it is laid down by nature, and nothing can affect this, except for heredity and. Sometimes there are such cases that in a year the eyes of children can change color not once, not twice, but several times.

Since the eyes only change in the direction of darkening, do not expect a dark-eyed child to have blue eyes. Conversely, a blue-eyed child may become brown-eyed over time. The color of the eyes in newborns depends only on the amount of melanin: the more it is, the darker the eyes will be. That is, in a baby with a high content of melanin, the eyes will be brown, and with a low content - blue or green. How much melanin is released is determined by the color of the parents' eyes and is inherited genetically.

In addition to age-related changes, babies' eyes also change depending on their mood:

1. When the baby cries, the color becomes clearer and changes towards green.
2. In the usual calm state, the color remains bluish.
3. When hungry, the color darkens.
4. In a state of sleep, the color changes back to cloudy.

Features of the changes

The first year may already be marked by the fact that a change in the color of the iris will occur in it, but most often the mark of 3 or 3 is considered the final date for establishing the color. If the child is brown-eyed, then his eyes will already acquire a permanent shade.

For others, the transition will be most noticeable between the age of six months and 9 months, since at this time melanin has already accumulated in sufficient quantities to change the color of the eyes of babies. The shade transition is more visible in light-eyed babies: they can turn from blue-eyed to green-eyed. If the eyes are dark blue, then they are more likely to become brown or remain the same. First, dark blotches are determined on the iris, and then it gradually becomes a different color.

The following statements can serve as interesting facts about the color of the eyes of a newborn:

1. Up to 4 years, the color of the eyes undergoes changes, after this it is also possible, but rarely.
2. The eyes can only darken, but not brighten, since the process of melanin production is aimed at darkening the color.
3. The child can get eyes of different colors. This phenomenon is called heterochromia and is associated with unevenly distributed melanin in the eyes. Even less common is heterochromia of one eye, when one eye can have 2 or more shades, most often of the same primary color, but some of them will be brighter and the other part paler. The reasons for the occurrence are a genetic predisposition or disease, so to determine the cause, it is better to constantly visit an ophthalmologist to monitor the condition.
4. Albinos will have red eyes - people with a low content of melanin or no melanin at all, and an excess of melanin will lead to the formation of black.
5. Up to 3 months, the child does not distinguish between objects - everything seems to pass in front of him in a veil, and he reacts only to color. After this age, vision begins to stabilize, and the gaze is fixed on the object. At six months, a child can distinguish figures, and only at a year does the adaptation of vision take place and it approaches the most natural conditions. By this time, the formation of melanin also ends.

So, the color of the eyes changes in about a year, and in some the process is formed up to 3 years of age. Therefore, if you want to know what color your baby's eyes will be and when they will change, be patient or calculate the probability using the table of the relationship between the color of the eyes of the newborn and the color of the eyes of the parents.

Many future parents, while still happily expecting a baby, think about who he will look like. Will he be blond and grey-eyed, like his mother, or will he have brown hair and dark brown eyes, like his father. Or maybe they will turn out to be green, like grandma's. And how surprised the newly-made parents are when they are shown a newborn with bright blue or sky-blue eyes in the maternity hospital, which none of the closest relatives have.

When it changes

As a rule, the eyes of newly born children have a shade different from that which they will acquire later. It is useless to try to guess what they will become, peering into the face of a baby who has just been born, because his eyes are very likely to be cloudy blue. This is due to the fact that the iris in newborns does not contain melanin at all, the amount of which determines the shade.

It is impossible to say exactly when the eyes of a newborn will acquire a permanent color. All children develop individually and the color of the iris also changes at different times. For some, it becomes permanent in the first months of life. For others, this happens somewhere in the year, or even later. And it happens that the process of changing the shade is delayed for years. However, on average, eye color changes at 9-12 months.

Newborn baby eye color

Most children come into this world with dark blue or greyish eyes. Exceptions are possible only if the baby is very swarthy or belongs to a dark-skinned race: then they will immediately turn out to be brown.

The color of the eyes of a newborn depends on the nationality. So, most small Europeans are born with an iris of light blue, blue or even purple. In children belonging to the Mongoloid race, immediately after birth they will be greenish-brown. And for dark-skinned children of the Negroid race, they will turn out to be dark brown.

Factors affecting the color of the iris

The color of the eyes of a newborn is determined not only by the shade of the iris of his mother and father. It is also influenced by factors such as:

• Genes of relatives, and not necessarily close ones. Sometimes the color of the eyes of grandparents, both relatives and cousins, is transmitted to the baby. And sometimes children inherit it from their ancient ancestors.
• Skin color, race and nationality of parents.
• amount of pigment. It is different already at the birth of a newborn, and it is on how much melanin in the iris that their eye color depends.

Melanin- a pigment that performs an important function - paints the iris in a certain color. Melanin accumulates in the chromatophores located on the outer layer of the iris. The most common color is dark brownish. The less melanin in the chromatophores, the lighter the shade will be. This is the reason for the blue, blue or gray shades. With a large amount of melanin, the iris will be brownish.

Sometimes, under the influence of pathological changes in the liver, the iris becomes yellow. And if the melanin production process is disturbed in the body, the iris becomes pink or reddish.

If the baby's eyes have acquired a clear yellow tint, this is a reason to see a doctor. The yellowness of the iris most often appears with jaundice and liver diseases.

Blue

They are observed in most babies in the first months of their life, but they do not always remain so. By the year, such eyes can become brown or grayish.

This is the most variable color of the iris - as a rule, its shade will change repeatedly until it becomes permanent. If the child's eyes remain blue, then their final color is established by 2-4 years.

As a rule, the milky-blue shade of the eyes of a newborn changes to darker or lighter, it can even become greenish or grayish. Most often, blue-eyed people are fair-skinned people with golden or ashy hair.

Blue eyes in humans are due to a mutation in which very little melanin is produced in the iris.

The blue tint is due to the fact that there are collagen fibers in the outer layer of the iris, despite the fact that there are no blue or blue pigments there at all. This shade itself is due to optical scattering of light.

gray

Gray is a common color of the iris. If the density of collagen in the stroma is high, then the child's eyes will turn out to be light gray, with a lower density, they will become gray-bluish.

The presence of melanin imparts a yellowish or brownish hue. Gray color, like blue, does not depend on the presence of pigment, but on the scattering of light.

If the baby is gray-eyed from birth, then with age, most likely, the color will not change dramatically. They can only slightly lighten or darken, or acquire a bluish or greenish tint.

Blue

Blue is also associated not with the amount of melanin in the iris, but with the scattering and refraction of light rays. It happens when the collagen fibers on the outer layer of the iris are less dense, and there is very little melanin in it. The lower the density of collagen, the brighter or darker blue tint will be obtained. Sometimes it is very deep and dark - shades of indigo.

hazel

As already noted, almost all babies are born with blue or sky blue eyes. As melanin accumulates in the iris, its color in many of them acquires a brownish tint, which will become more saturated over time.

Brown color is due to a large amount of melanin in the iris, which absorbs most of the light rays. And the reflected light gives a brownish tint.

Greens

It is determined by a small amount of melanin and the presence of a yellowish or light brownish lipofuscin pigment in the outer layers of the iris. Due to the fact that the blue or blue scattered in the stroma is superimposed on it, and this color is formed.

Bright and saturated green is a rarity, since most often green eyes are with grayish or light brownish patches. More common in Northern or Central Europe. Sometimes found in natives of southern Europe.

Green eyes of various shades are found in only 2% of the world's population.

If a newborn has grassy or emerald eyes, then they will remain so for life. Over time, they can only slightly brighten or darken.

Table, what color can be

It is impossible to determine exactly what color the eyes of a newborn will be. One can only guess with what degree of probability he will inherit it from his parents or another relative from previous generations. For this we have developed a table.

How is it changing

In children in the first year of life, especially if they are blue-eyed from birth, the shade can change repeatedly. There is nothing wrong with this, but provided that the iris does not become yellowish.

Light-colored eyes in babies tend to temporarily change color under a variety of circumstances, such as stress, weather conditions, lighting.

Brown eyes can also change under the influence of circumstances. For example, if the baby is hungry, then they can become greenish, and if upset or stressed, they can become grayish. The shade changes greatly with the disease.

If there is a malfunction in the formation of melanin in the iris, the child has heterochromia - a difference in the color of the right eye from the left or uneven coloring of the iris.

A few color suggestions

• A dark-eyed child primarily pays attention to the color of an object, while a light-eyed child pays attention to its shape.
• Dark-eyed children love all bright and warm tones, while light-eyed children prefer muted cold shades.
• Brown-eyed children are prone to spontaneous actions and they are more emotional. Gray-eyed, blue-eyed and green-eyed children are restrained, better control their feelings and emotions, they are better oriented in space.
• Brown-eyed people are more sociable than light-eyed people.
• Light-eyed people, as a rule, have their own opinion, while dark-eyed people often use generally accepted categories.
• Blue-eyed people have a scientific mindset, and brown-eyed people have creative personalities.

The eyes of most children at birth have a completely different shade than the one that is genetically laid down. Many of those from whom they acquire shades of amber, cinnamon or silver are born with bright blue eyes, which then either darken or become lighter. The table will tell parents what shade of the iris the baby will have. But sometimes it turns out that the shade is inherited from great-grandfather, great-grandmother. In any case, a blue-eyed, green-eyed or brown-eyed baby is not so important, because the main thing is that he is healthy and happy.

A change in eye color in a newborn as they grow up is a normal reaction. The fact is that at birth, the body lacks the pigment melanin, which protects against ultraviolet radiation. As the pigment is produced, the color of the eyes begins to change, often the baby's blue eyes become brown.

The absence of melanin in the human body at the time of birth is due to the fact that while the baby is developing in utero, there is no contact with light sources, therefore, there is no need to start the protective mechanism. This pigment begins to be produced as soon as the baby opens its eyes and bright sources of light appear in front of its eyes, be it light from light bulbs or the sun's rays. It is for this reason that most newborns have a light blue iris.

The effect of melanin on eye color: click to enlarge

Eye color changes in children

Gradually, as the production of melanin occurs, the color of the eyes of babies will begin to change.

• A baby, for example, will change their shade several times a day. This phenomenon can be observed, as a rule, up to six months of age.
• Also, the color of newborns often changes when their mood changes due to various psycho-emotional states.
• If the baby is hungry, then his eye irises will turn gray.
• Closer to sleep, the baby looks at his surroundings with eyes of an indistinct shade.
• When a baby cries, green shades of the eyes are often observed.
• During a cheerful and cheerful state, they are saturated blue.

All this, as mentioned earlier, occurs under the influence of melanin production. A permanent eye color in children will be formed by the age of one and a half years, but there are cases when the pigment substance continues to accumulate in the human body up to two, and sometimes even after five years.

The more melanin was produced from the first days after birth, the darker the eyes of newborns will be. Accordingly, the smaller, the lighter, that is, the eyes will be painted in a heavenly, light blue, sometimes blue color. The blue color of the irises in young children occurs only due to certain refractive indices of light rays. Very rarely, but still it happens that a baby is born with a gray or green color. Usually, if this happens, it does not change in the future, only a change in shade is possible.

Age of eye color change in children

In order to bring at least some clarity to the process of changing eye color in children from birth to adulthood, we will consider this process in more detail.

• As mentioned earlier, most often children from the moment of birth have blue or dull gray eyes.
• Also, often, brown-eyed babies can be found.
• Rare are newborns with a green color of the eye iris.

Basically, the first color of the organs of the visual apparatus, which differs from blue, is a factor of heredity.

Let's look at how and when the color of the eyes of babies changes, depending on their age.

First half year (3 months)

The first changes in color usually begin at three months:

• This process will begin most quickly in children with a large amount of melanin. At this time, brown color is most often formed.
• The rest do not appear, or are constantly changing.
• Also, a permanent eye color can already be observed at this age in green-eyed babies from birth.

From half a year to a year

Cardinal changes in the iris begin to appear by the age of six months or one year:

• At this time, the green color is already completely formed. The only thing that will happen to them next is a change in shade. They can either lighten or become dark green.
• A blue-eyed baby by this time has every chance to change the color of the visual apparatus to gray or acquire a brown color.
• The brown color of the organs of vision, as a rule, does not change upon reaching this age, but certain circumstances can occur that affect the production of melanin, they can turn gray or green.
• Gray eyes can also undergo a change from sky to hazel.

Three to five years

The period of three to five years is the final in the formation of eye color and with a high probability can show the final color that the child will have for the rest of his life.

• The blue color (if it has not changed to brown or gray during this time) is likely to become light blue, sky blue, cornflower blue, etc.
• Green-eyed babies, as time shows, at this age can only change the shade.
• A brown eye can become fiery brown, yellow brown, dark brown. But, it is also possible to change the pigment substances to gray or green, with their subsequent change in shade.
• Gray eyes during this period can remain either gray or change to brown if melanin production increases, or heavenly. If during this period there were changes in the eyes from gray to blue, then during the further development of the child only changes with their shade will occur.

The final eye color, according to statistics and a number of studies, will be formed after five years.

In order to more clearly present all these situations, let's present them in the form of a pivot table:

Eye Color Change from Birth to Final Color Formation: Click to Enlarge

But even all these painted situations must be combined with the assumptions that were obtained by geneticists.

Rare case - heterochromia

Sometimes it happens that the production of melanin is unstable. With an excess or insufficient amount of the pigment substance, a situation is possible, as a result of which the child's eye color changes unevenly. One eye will be colored and become blue, and the other brown. A feature that is expressed in a different color of the eyes in a young organism is commonly called heterochromia.

Heterochromia does not affect the visual acuity in any way, but only indicates the features of melanin production. Most often, this phenomenon passes, and the child's eye color changes. But, sometimes a person is left with irises of different colors for life.

Despite the fact that most newborn children have a blue eye color, this does not mean that they will remain so. It all depends on the rate of melanin production, and the hereditary factor also plays an important role in the process of changing the color of the iris.

There is an opinion that the eyes of a newborn are necessarily blue, but this is not entirely true - it can be absolutely anything. But the content of pigments that determine the shade of the iris changes with age, so the appearance of a newborn will say very little about how he will look when he grows up a little. About when the color of the eyes of a newborn baby changes and how this happens, we will tell further.

The color of a person's eyes is determined by a coloring pigment - melanin. It is located in the iris - a small area of ​​the choroid of the brain, which is adjacent to the front surface.

It has a round shape and surrounds the pupil. The main function of the pigment is to protect the retina from excessive solar radiation. Eye color depends on the location and amount of melanin.

In addition to melanin, lipofuscin may be present in the eyes - it gives a yellowish tint. The complete absence of melanin occurs in albinos, while the eyes have a red or pink tint.

Features of the distribution of melanin is a hereditary trait, but the amount of melanin can change with age.

Change with age in a child

During intrauterine development, melanin is produced in a small amount - this is due to the fact that the need for it will appear only after birth. Therefore, at birth, they often have blond hair, eyes, and skin tone.

Depending on the distribution of melanin, the eyes of newborns may be pale blue, light gray, greenish or amber. Some babies are born with a pronounced gray or brown iris.

The distribution of melanin remains unchanged, and its production increases with age. Because of this, there is a gradual darkening of the eyes to their final color. How much it will change depends on the individual characteristics of the child, the color can remain almost the same (most often this happens with gray eyes) or darken sharply from light gray to brown.

When should I change

The most significant changes in appearance occur before 3 years. At this time, the color of the eyes, hair, skin tone may become darker or lighter than it was. In the process, the shade of the iris can change several times, so it's still too early to talk about the exact color of the child's eyes.

Until what age does this happen?

Most often, the final eye color is formed by 3 years. During this time, several color changes can occur, sometimes quite strong. If the color continues to change after three years, then the baby is a happy owner of chameleon eyes, and this feature of appearance will adorn him.

But if parents are worried about this, or the baby shows any symptoms of impaired vision, then it should be shown to an ophthalmologist. If the eye color was determined earlier, there is nothing to worry about.

Will it change or stay the same

Most often, the eyes become darker as the child grows older. But this may not happen, and then the color of the iris will remain the same or almost the same as at birth.

This happens quite often. As a rule, in cases where the baby was already born with dark eyes - brown or black, which simply cannot darken even more. The opposite situation is that the child has inherited a small amount of melanin from the parents, and his eyes will only darken slightly, remaining gray or blue.

How to determine the final eye color

Eye color is an inherited trait, so it must be determined not only by the shade of the baby's iris, but also by the color of the eyes of parents and more distant relatives. Based on the statistics, the following regularities were derived:

• If the baby was born with brown eyes, then their color does not change;
• The child of brown-eyed parents in most cases will be brown-eyed, green or blue eyes are much less common;
• Parents have gray eyes - the child may have gray, brown or blue;
• Blue eyes in parents - children will have the same;
• Green eyes in parents - the child will be green-eyed, less often - brown or blue eyes;
• The combination of brown / gray in parents is any option in a child;
• Parents have brown / green - brown or green, less often blue;
• The combination of brown / blue - brown, blue or gray, but never green;
• The combination of gray / green - any eye color in a child;
• Gray / blue - gray or blue in the baby;
• Green / blue - any of these two options, but not brown or gray.

In fact, the inheritance of eye color is somewhat more complicated. If parents have doubts about where this color came from, you can consult a medical geneticist. This is an expensive, but very accurate procedure.

When does heterochromia occur?

Heterochromia is a different eye color in one person. In this case, both eyes can have a different color (one brown, the other blue - the most common option, complete heterochromia), or one sector of the iris is colored in a color that differs from the rest of the circle (sectoral heterochromia), or the inner and outer edges of the iris differ in color ( central heterochromia).

The central or sectoral manifestation of the condition may or may not be symmetrical, appearing in one or both eyes. Heterochromia is not considered a pathology.

The reason is a hereditary violation of the distribution of melanin. It may not be visible in a newborn, but becomes noticeable after the final establishment of eye color. She does not pose any danger to the baby.

In some cases, a change in the color of the iris can be a symptom of inflammatory processes (iritis, iridocyclitis, vascular lesions), but then other signs of pathology appear along with it.

What affects eye color

First of all, heredity affects eye color. Since brown eyes are the most resistant to solar radiation, they have become the most common eye color on Earth. The green and gray irises cope with their function a little worse (there is little melanin in green, and it is located too deep in gray), these eye colors are approximately the same.

Blue eyes do not protect well from the sun, so they are often found among representatives of the peoples of Northern Europe. The rarest color is blue, it is associated with a small amount of melanin located deep, and at the same time with a low density of iris fibers. It is advisable for owners of such eyes to wear sunglasses.

Diseases that affect eye color

In addition to normal factors, pathological ones can also affect the color of the iris. The most famous among them is albinism. This is a hereditary disease in which the production of melanin is disrupted - it stops partially or completely. With partial albinism, the eyes may have a blue or green color, but usually quite weakly expressed. With complete albinism, the color of the eyes becomes red - this is the translucent vessels.

With glaucoma, the color of the eyes becomes lighter due to increased intraocular pressure, and some drugs for it, on the contrary, cause darkening of the eyes. The bright blue color of the eyes of a newly born baby may be a sign of congenital glaucoma.

Inflammatory processes in the iris can lead to a decrease in the amount of pigment or its complete disappearance in the affected sector.

How does eye color affect vision?

Eye color does not affect vision at all - the iris is not involved in the optical system of the eye. But the amount of melanin affects the patient's ability to tolerate exposure to bright sunlight without harming the retina. Blue-eyed people are more likely to experience eye irritation, photophobia, and fatigue after intense visual stress.