Eye Contact

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I never had problem with eye contact though it does freak me out when people look at me for too long.

I have a problem with eye contact. I dont look at people in the eyes for more than a second at time. A lady i used to live with tried to make me look in her eyes by holding my head towards her, my eyes would still look away.

Mayby i should buy some sunglasses to hide my eyes.

I understand why people do it... I just see no point in it really for myself. Sometimes I will do pretty good on it, but other times I could care less.

It's the worst though, if it isn't on my terms and someone is "forcing" me to do it. My boyfriend will ask this at times, and in those situations, I'm sitting there thinking "keep looking at the eyes, keep looking at the eyes", and it's hard to listen to anything he's saying.

I don't like it if others make the eye contact first-it makes me feel weird. Maybe because I figure people are ALWAYS trying to interpret things other than what I'm actually saying verbally, and I know they look for body language and all... it's just one more way for people to be trying to read me all of the time, and I'm just not going to offer myself up to it simply because it's "normal".

I will when I am comfortable with it. I don't need people eyballing me all day long-I'm weird enough looking to them without the eye contact... don't need to go giving them a real reason to think I'm strange by giving them another thing to read into.

When I do do it, though, I get very little out if it aside from I'm either looking at your eye or I'm not.

This is all really interesting.

I'm on a message board that is full of NTs - totally different subject matter - and I'm going to post a question just asking in general some things about eye contact. Will share here what I find out.

At an earlier point in my life I found eye contact uncomfortable but it doesn't seem to bother me these days. I'm still aware that I don't make as much eye contact as some people but the reason isn't really a fear or aversion. No, I'm a visual thinker so usually when I'm speaking there are images forming in my mind which act as descriptive aids for whatever thought/idea/concept I'm trying to convey. When I'm trying to visualize something the eyes are too much of a distraction to stay focused. Thus I have to either look to the side or sort-of unfocus and stare "through" the other person's face.

However, I've noticed that the amount of eye contact is highly variable even within the NT population. In particular females tend to give more eye contact than males. Also, more aggressive "type-A" personalities tend to give more eye contact than more introverted individuals. While I give less eye contact than most I don't think I'm way out of the norm. I still look at people often enough to give some non-verbal gestures that let them know when I'm listening, interested, confused, understanding, pleased, displeased, etc. etc.. I just have to look away frequently, especially when I have to think.

Eye contact does take quite a bit of energy for me though so sometimes when I'm tired or depressed I'll forget to look at people more often if I don't remind myself. Sometimes I'm just in an unusually contemplative mood where it's hard to keep myself from staring off into space while listening to someone speak. I can also appear preoccupied or lost in thought, even when I am, in fact, listening very intently to what's being said!

^^^I'm visual as well. If I can't see it---have to take my eyes off it---I can't think straight either. I have a little stream of videos playing off to the left a bit... at least that's where I keep looking. Conversations are almost like having the tv on in the background.

Most of the time I find eye contact painful.

Eye contact was never painful for me.It was simply defocussing....It's a well known fact that the eyes reveal a lot about what person is thinking or feeling-too much for me.I get so distracted by those things that i can't do anything else,even THINK about anything else.However,the whole situation changes in an emotional moment-than i get extremely anxious if i maintain eye contact for even less than half a second.

I never had any problems with eye contact, it comes naturally, like the reaction someone clapping right in front of you.

I thought I had great eye contact as I got older and started looking more at faces but after my diagnosis, I lost it all.

The eye contact I gave was fake and I could no longer pretend I felt really comfortable with it after my AS was confirmed.

The positive note here is that I can now hold a gaze at a distance and it is real and not forced and I do genuinely look at the eyes; close-up sometimes has me looking in the right direction but misting my eyes so that I don't really see the other person and sometimes all of the other stimuli such as noise, lights, speech crowd out what I am seeing.

There are some people I never look at, especially if I have to have a proper conversation with them, I need to be able to think to respond.

The eye contact issue has been a huge issue with me and I still struggle with it but I believe that my own difficulties here are improving slowly, though I no longer force myself to look, I let it happen naturally.

I think any autistic who can learn, should learn to fake eye contact. Looking past people's heads, or at their foreheads or mouths, is a good way for the NT to get the information he needs from your face, without you getting distracted by all the quick little twitchy movements his face makes. It really improves communication when it's possible to compromise like that, so both people get what they need.

I do occasionally close my eyes while listening. But nowadays, that is only when the person I'm listening to has an accent or a speech impediment, and I need to listen especially hard to catch what they're saying.

I don't mind eyes themselves at all. I can sit and discuss something with someone and I will probably err on the side of making too much eye contact, because I learned as a kid that looking in eyes = telling the truth, in body language.

However if I feel that I am making an emotional connection with someone by doing that, then, I find it jarring.

I also look past the head if I am thinking or listening hard, but I think that is normal

I've never heard anyone else talk about the which eye to focus on and getting sucked in before! It's a relief when you see other people have felt the same. I had to sign up when I read all your posts because I feel similarly and I have a method for dealing with it that maybe others will find helpful. Callista touched on this. I just watch people's mouths as they talk - they have no idea (at least I think) that I'm not looking at their eyes and it helps me pay attention. It also develops the skill of lip reading which can come in pretty handy and interesting, especially as accents and things come into play. For me it started because I had trouble understanding just from listening. If there's extra noise and someone's talking and I can't see their mouth I get about 5% of what they say. If I can see it, then I get everything and all the while I can have a normal conversation without having to look once into those kinda spooky eyes.

And re just looking into someone's eyes, there's just too much info passing back and forth - complete overload.