Sneezing when looking at bright light

Poll #1571 Sneezing when looking at bright light

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 12

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Do you often sneeze when you suddenly look at a bright light?

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Yes
3 (25.0%)

No
8 (66.7%)

I don't know
1 (8.3%)

And...

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I assumed everyone was the same.
1 (14.3%)

I knew some people did and some people didn't
4 (57.1%)

I knew it was called "Photic sneeze reflex"
2 (28.6%)

The phenomenon is apparently called <a href=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photic_sneeze_reflex>Photic sneeze reflex</a>. If I suddenly see a bright light, typically driving from shadow into bright sunlight, or suddenly looking up, I sneeze. (The straight dope article mentioned that it could be a serious problem for fighter pilots, where a fraction of a second convulsion and blindness when you come out of a cloud can be the difference between winning a dogfight and ploughing into the ground.)

The funny things are (1) I'm sure last time I tried to look it up, I could find almost no references online, but now I could find lots. I don't know if lots more got put online, or if google indexed them better, or if I just had bad search terms before. There was an article on straight dope, but I don't think it mentioned the 30% (?) of people figure.

And (2) people are apparently very surprised to discover their own experience isn't universal. I remember mum advising me to look at a bright light (typically the sky as a whole) if I was about to sneeze and couldn't get it out, and have always noticed it since. But I once commented on it to someone else who was very puzzled and said "What? You're allergic to sunshine?" And I assumed everyone was the same, because normally simple reflex things do seem to be.

Supposedly, it applies to about a third of people, and is probably genetic, and probably dominant. Some studies thought there were a fixed number of sneezes, and had some guesses as to the cause but weren't certain.