Published on 12, July, 2020
I've been here before a couple of times, but keep coming across this idea that somehow eye contact is just something people on the spectrum failed to learn and can somehow be conditioned to resolve.
One of the problems is how do you know when eye contact isn't happening. So many people on the spectrum resolve having the deficiency pointed out to them over and over by looking at another part of the face. I uselessly and pointlessly look at mouths - and am told I appear to have good eye contact!
How do you tell if someone isn't directly making eye contact? I suggest it is quite hard to verify.
Also what is eye contact? I ask this particularly because some people on the spectrum feel they do have good eye contact. But if it isn't coming naturally how do they determine what is good eye contact?
My understanding is that making eye contact is signalling to others that you relate to them, or respect them, or obey them. It is read as a sign of loyalty or aquiescence by the recipient. So people who don't make good eye contact are seen as hostile, deceitful or deviant.
But aside from that, it isn't the eye contact that's important surely? It's the attention to other people's faces to understand how facial expressions qualify the spoken word, or reveal a person's true intentions. (Also it is about what facial expressions the person on the spectrum conveys for others to read, which may be ambiguous or not easily read if the face is often averted).
The point about eye contact/facial expression recognition is that people on the spectrum miss out on social cues, and are much more literal in the interpretation of spoken languge because they don't pick up on the qualifications conveyed by facial expression.
Therefore they do poorly at social interfacing, and lack social referencing (the feed back non autistic people get from social engagement).
Having stated the underlying difficulties, I don't think it is correctable. You can learn something about the meanings of facial expressions (hence all those social stories pictures), but it is no way as efficient as doing it instinctively. And what the scientists forget is that people on the spectrum are not only not reading it properly they are not conveying non-verbal information correctly.
So it does alarm me when I see yet again some 'professional' talking about lack of eye contact as if it is something to be cured.
Isn't it time the basics of autism (rather than just the triad of impairments) were properly understood?
Hi again,
Thank you all - as I've only just begun my diagnosis journey, this is all very new to me, and it is such a breath of fresh air to dicuss these things at last with anyone that can even comprehend any of what I'm trying to describe!
When I am in the company of only one other person, I am definitely most comfortable not looking at them at all. Input from my other senses just seems distracting, and I'll often let my eyes drift out of focus. I am only now finding the courage even to ask people to turn off TV or music when trying to chat (folks that leave the TV on in the "background" are one of my biggest pet peeves!)
Attempting to make eye contact, or thinking about my posture, immediately makes me incredibly self-conscious, and I wil then start to lose the thread. If I am truly feeling involved in the conversation, I find that I often "zone out" - there's such an intense focus on the words that I become almost unaware of my surroundings. This happens often when I am with my therapist - she now knows to give me five minutes at the end of the session to "come to my senses", as I can become quite disorientated - like waking up in the morning in an unfamiliar place.
When in a crowd, much as Marjorie describes, the mouth-watching helps me to maintain focus on the person I'm talking to. I'm in my mid-forties, yet often can still hear those ultra-sonic cat scaring devices (ouch!) - so there's little wrong my ears, I'm sure (despite having played drums and bass for three decades!)
I think this ties in a little with what I mentioned before about "cognitive load". When the conversation is moving very quickly, I often can't find the right mouth to focus on quickly enough (assuming it's even in line of sight.) I feel like I become one of those "eagle eyes" action-man dolls, eyes constantly scanning back and forth, searching for the place where sound and sight are synchronised. The need to find this synchronisation far outweighs any consideration I might have for "appropriate" eye-contact, even if I were comfortable with it - and it is very tiring!
I find the hubbub of a busy bar or restaurant very uncomfortable in general - so many voices all at once, yet no particular one that I can focus on. If there is also blaring music, the sound of people eating etc. it all seems to become just a single, oppressive, formless kind of noise. Add too much visual stimulus on top of that, and eventually I will need to escape - either get away from it physically, or retreat into my own head and become unresponsive to what's going on around me. I doubt that I need spell out how this reaction is (mis)interpreted by the "NT" friends that one is hoping to socialise with!
Re:the attitude of professionals and voluntary organisations. From my experiences and research so far, sadly, I find very little to contradict what Longman has said.
Even those professionals with a more empathetic view, such as Tony Attwood, are highly critical of the diagnostic standards that are currently in use - particularly the almost complete lack of recognition of the variety of sensory issues experienced, and the way that the strain of "passing as normal" so often leads to melt-downs and co-morbid mental health problems.
When I read of efforts to "train" people in eye-contact and body language, or to control non-damaging stimming, I do not see this as helping people with a disability - it's all about making sure that "NTs" are not made to feel uncomfortable by our behaviour, no matter how benign. We're only worthy of help so long as we're "striving to be normal", and the onus of finding a workable way to communicate is always on us and/or our carers, never the public that surrounds us.
To access help at all, we are also forced to agree that we have a "disability" even if we personally do not think of our cognitive differences that way (I make no judgement here, I think either attitude is perfectly valid - my beef is that the professionals insist on deciding what our attitude should be, when it should be a matter for each individual and their loved ones.)
Is it really our different neurology, or is it society, that does the "disabling"? I have to stifle a chuckle every time I hear the endless rhetoric about how our society allows so much "freedom of choice". I've found nowehere yet that I can "choose" to have a nice pint of hand-pulled ale in an atmosphere that I can comfortably socialise in. I have yet to work in a place where I can "choose" not be assaulted by the stench of aftershaves, perfumes and deodorants (surely the word "deodorant" implies something that removes smell - not a pong that is so overpowering that I want to retch!!).
In my case, I have never received any help at all until presenting to my GP suffering acute depression and anxiety - usually with my social life in tatters, and on the verge of unemployment (as I again find myself). Over three decades, this has happened to me four or five times, and I have rebuilt my life each time only to have it come tumbling down again a few years later. Only now is the task of finding the underlying reason for those collapses being addressed - and as with so many of us, this comes with the caveat that the diagnosis will not allow access to any helpful services - because there aren't any! (except for those of us with co-morbid learning difficulties, or who are on the verge of suicide.)
Of course, I agree that where resources are limited, the help should be targeted at those with the most dire needs. But the way that "high-functioning" people (whatever that's supposed to mean) are dealt with does not even make sense on these terms.
It is surely better (and cheaper!) for us to continuously receive the little help we would need to be productive members of society than to have us lurching from one acute crisis to the next. As each crisis point is reached, we then need access to much more intensive and expensive interventions. All this time, while on the inevitable waiting lists and then receiving our therapy, we are unable to contribute fully to the world around us, and are competing for the very crisis services that those in more dire circumstances so deperately need.
Phew! I didn't intend to rant quite so much there, quite some catharsis! Thankyou very much for your patience if you have read this far!
Best wishes
Trog.