Eye contact

I am uncomfortable lookimg people in the eye, and I get increasingly uncomfortable the longer I sustain eye contact, until I have to look away. My mother was always banging on about people who don’t look you in the eye being shifty, so I quickly learned that eye contact was expected of me. 

i tend to look people in the eye at the start of a conversation and then look at their lower face, interspersed with eye contact. For me eye contact isn’t anything to do with opening a window to the soul;  it just isn’t a natural place for me to focus. 

Autismman said:

Giving someone your eyes is like opening up a door to let others into your world and it’s a scary idea.

I found it really helpful to use some logic to dispell the superstitions you talk about. 

The eyes are just organs designed to receive light and transform it into electrical signals which go to the brain. They are not capable of anything supernatural like seeing into someones soul otherwise I would see the soul of others when I look at them. Simple.

Treat them like when you look at someones ears or lips - just another set of organs.

I find timing how long I can spend looking at a part of anyone to be useful too - 3 seconds max if I need to look at someones eyes (eg important meeting, asking my partner what their day was like etc).

The one exception is when I have to be the responsible adult in a situation where someone is potentially being untruthful and it is my responsibility to assess their duplicity. Then a much longer stare is justified but I use masking / scripting to do this.

These are just me experiences and thoughts - make of them what you will.

I too have eye contact difficulties. I have no problem maintaining eye contact when I am listening to the other person but look away, up, down and side to side when I am speaking. It is almost as if in order to process what I am saying I need to reduce my ocular stimulation. I often roll my eyes when thinking or concentrating. Of course it is usually taken the wrong way.

As a child,  I can clearly remember being told by a parent that people who don’t make eye contact aren’t to be trusted and have something to hide. Strange how you never forget some things.

I mentioned at the end of my assessment that I do know I’m not very good with eye contact, the assessor smiled and agreed. Looking into someone’s eyes or vice versa, is like looking into someone’s soul, it’s just too personal. I can pretend for short periods and look at the bridge of someone’s nose.

Eye contact is interesting.

Prey animals usually have eyes on the sides of their heads to give good all round vision, e.g. sheep, horses, cows, small birds. When they look at oech other or other non-predators, they see one eye.

Predators usually have eyes of the front of their heads for better vision and depth perception, at the cost of limited field of view. Cats, dogs, birds of prey.

Prey animals are uneasy when they see something with 2 eyes looking at them, they may move away or freeze. If you look sideways at farm animals they are more happy.

Small birds will freeze till the see you look away.

Predators see it as a dominance thing. They may move away, submit or become aggressive if they think they should be dominant.

The animal whisperers I have seen are careful with eye contact, body posture and verbal tone.

Among apes, including humans, it is more complicated and facial expressions are also important.

Staring is rude and aggressive, looking down is submissive, looking away is disinterested. But note that excessive eye contact is as awkward as not enough.

Body language obviously plays a big part along with eye contact.

For humans, I read we have the whites of our eyes visible so that it is easy to tell where someone is looking. It is suggested that because we are social creatures this is important in order to be able to organise into groups, as individually we are weak. This is why unusual eye contact is problematic as it is a hardwired instinct type thing.

It seems to make sense, but I don't know for sure how true all this stuff is.

Hi,

I am diagnosed ASD level 1

I really struggle with eye contact as well unless it is someone I trust. If I feel awkward with a person I absolutely can't look at them at all and it comes across really bad. I know I'm doing it but I just can't make myself look at someone if I don't want to. I have tried but it's almost painful.

In restaurant situations it got pointed out to me I don't look at people when ordering food. I try and force myself but it's been pointed out to me I now order food with my eyes closed!

At work I can come across better on video call as I am then focused on the actually camera rather than the video screen of people, but to them it looks like I'm looking at them. In big or hostile meetings in person I just stare at the table as I can't look at people and again it doesn't come across well. I try but I just can't do it if I'm uncomfortable.

In my hobby (I play modern board games) I don't have to give eye contact as I can just focus on the game which really helps me.

I'm sorry I don't have any advice, but I wanted to reach out to say that I get it and share the struggle. If you find good ways of adapting or coping let me know! Try not to be hard on yourself, you don't do these things deliberately and we are trying to fit into a mainly NT environment. It's tough.

Stuart333 said:

I can stare animals down. I have done it to dogs and even a cat once, which was hard. You need to not blink and just stare. Which I can do for long periods. Doing it to people though is not a good idea though.

Doing it to animals isn't a good idea, either, for your own safety:

American Kennel Club - Why You Shouldn’t Stare Down a Dog

"If they feel overstimulated, these pets might react by trying to end the uncomfortable interaction and getting you to move away. This might manifest as a change in body language, barking, lunging, snapping, or even biting."

You’ve described me perfectly, I just couldn’t get the words down. 

Prolonged eye contact causes me difficulties with communication and with my responses. I’m pretty sure that it’s too much for me to concentrate while thinking of what I need to say or how I should respond. I try to look for a couple of seconds and then my eyes dart around everywhere before returning to meet their gaze for another couple of seconds. 
I am super conscious about this as I can see how people can quickly lose interest if you’re unable to maintain and drift away from the conversation. It feels like they are being rude to me but guess they think my lack of eye contact is rude to them. 

Weirdly the only time I’m comfortable looking someone in the eyes is when they are not looking at me. 

When I was up younger, e.g. in my teens and 20s,  I would not hold eye contact and looked down.

I asked my psychologist recently and I don't think they thought I am currently that unusual. However, once I started to think about it and observe myself, I now don't know what I do naturally.

I can stare animals down. I have done it to dogs and even a cat once, which was hard. You need to not blink and just stare. Which I can do for long periods. Doing it to people though is not a good idea though.

I can also do the thousand yard stare thing. Although this seems to be reducing since I've had diagnosis.

I really struggle with this. I can look my partner in the eyes and feel safe, same with my daughter, but with other people I really struggle, and when I try to maintain contact I end up looking weird, so I tend to not even bother trying anymore. It’s harder when they’re face on with me, even worse when up close, but further away it gets a bit easier. I have to keep looking away, but that makes me anxious because I worry how I’m coming across, and then because I’m anxious about that, I don’t really listen to what’s being said, which then only adds fuel to the fire haha. 

in theatre class I learned not to stare at the eyes, but rather the space between the eyes. We were taught that to keep us from cracking up during intense scenes, but somehow it transferred into a good life skill.

I concentrate on the eye itself rather than the person behind the eyes, I look at their colour, the way people have differnt flecks and rings of colour and the shape of the eye. I fi have to look at someone for a longish period of time I think about thier facial architecture, what could you tell from the underlying bone structure about gender, if you didn't know, about thier jaw line and cheek bones, the spacing of the nasal cavities etc as you would if you were going to reconstruct a face from a skull. I know its a bit weird, but it works for me.