THE MALE AND FEMALE SUBJECTS WERE RESIDENTS OF THE HARRIS COUNTY JUVENILE DETENTION HOME IN HOUSTON, TEX., AND WERE 7 TO 18 YEARS OLD. THEY HAD BEEN PLACED IN THE HOME FOR VARIOUS OFFENSES, INCLUDING STATUS OFFENSES. THE SUBJECTS WERE SCREENED FOR OCULAR PROBLEMS BY USING PROCEDURES AND CRITERIA OF THE MODIFIED CLINICAL TECHNIQUE. CLINICAL OPTOMETRIC FINDINGS OF THE JUVENILES WERE STATISTICALLY EVALUATED AND COMPARED TO DATA FROM THE GENERAL POPULATION. RESULTS SHOW THAT THE YOUTHS HAD A HIGHER REFERRAL RATE TO OPTHAMOLOGISTS AND PHYSICIANS FOR REFRACTIVE ERRORS, ORGANIC PROBLEMS, AND MUSCLE IMBALANCES THAN THE GENERAL POPULATION. THE MOST FREQUENT REFERRALS TO OPHTHAMOLOGISTS WERE FOR REFRACTIVE ERRORS (68.8 PERCENT), USUALLY MYOPIA AND MYOPIA WITH ASTIGMATISM. REFERRAL RATES OF 6.6 PERCENT FOR MUSCLE COORDINATION PROBLEMS ARE THREE TIMES HIGHER THAN FOR THE GENERAL POPULATION, AND ALL REFERRALS FOR MEDICAL PROBLEMS ARE SOMEWHAT HIGHER THAN FOR THE GENERAL POPULATION. THE DISTRIBUTION OF REFRACTIVE ERRORS SHOWS A MARKED DEGREE OF LEPTOKURTOSIS AND POSITIVE SKEWNESS; THIS IS IN CONTRAST TO THE GENERAL POPULATION'S TENDENCY TO LEPTOKURTOSIS AND NEGATIVE SKEWNESS. SPHERICAL EQUIVALENTS OF TOTAL REFRACTIVE ERRORS FOR MALES INDICATE HYPEROPIC REFRACTIVE ERRORS, IN CONTRAST TO THE FEMALE SUBJECTS WHO WERE MYOPIC. STUDY DATA AND REFERENCES ARE PROVIDED. (DAG)