Published on 12, July, 2020
Hello all
I have a question about eye contact. I can make and maintain eye contact, and I remember someone telling me when I was younger that I need to make sure to "look the interviewer in the eye" when I went for interviews. Which is one of my reasons for suspecting I am autistic rather than socially anxious. I don't like eye contact, I do not understand why people feel connected by eye contact.
I've been paying attention to this recently and I have noticed that when I look people in the eye, their eyes dart all over the place. Does anyone else recognize this? I wonder if my eyes are darting around and they are trying to follow or it's just something I'm picking up on.
I think the maintaining eye contact thing is a bit of a myth to be honest, I haven’t ever had any issues with making eye contact with people but the biggest issue I have is how long you’re suppose to maintain eye contact because we are taught it is very rude to not look at someone when they are talking to you because it’s considered "paying attention”.
It is possible that the reason why their eyes are darting is because they are checking their surroundings or they are uncomfortable because of how you are staring at them. I cannot tell you either way.
One of the reasons I have issues with eye contact though is because there is no clearly established amount of time where when you’re talking to someone how long you are suppose to maintain eye contact to “show” that you’re listening them. Is it a few seconds or the entire time they are talking? And even with that with everyone being their own unique individual so it can vary from person to person. It’d sure be nice if each individual person could just say “Hey, you don’t have to look at me when we’re talking.” or “Hey, looking up every five seconds is long enough to let me know that you’re paying attention.” or anything along those lines would make things so much easier…