Does anyone know...

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Why is it that the majority of folks on the Autism Spectrum have trouble, or even incapable, of looking people in the eye? I've looked a little into it, but never found anything that really explains it. I know the brain is wired different, but why does it prevent people on the Spectrum from looking people in the eyes? I consider it to be one of the more bizarre aspects of the disorder.

Having never found a permanent way past my insecurity, I can only conclude it is inherent ... but no, that still does not explain why it is there.

I have a short attention span, and after two minutes, I'm really struggling to look the other person, in the eyes. After 8 minutes, I'm looking at the wall, or at some object that's in the room.

I have colorblindness [mild] from my mother's side, my father was VERY walleyed, but I am not. I also have a HUGE eye phobia - getting my hasir cut as a child was agony because I KNEW those scissors were going to go straight into my eye, and when the dentist injects novocaine I am frozen, not because the needle will go the wrong place in my mouth, but because he will slip and jab my etye.

But all of that feels different from eye contact problems, which do not feel phobic, just a fact of existemnce like hating eggs. No idea on causation, but I think it has to be in the genetics somewhere.

Can't speak for anyone but me, but I suspect this may be true for a lot who haven't figured this out yet (if it is true for them that is):

I can't concentrate on people's speech if I'm looking them in the eye. It's sensory overload for me. It's distracting. A glance or two is all I can manage. If I expect to really hear what they're saying to me, I have to keep eye contact to a minimum. It only takes about three seconds of looking someone in the eye for me to realize the words I heard before that begin to sound like Charlie Browns teacher. I can't retain a thing they are saying. And that's even more rude in my opinion, than not looking them in the eye.

I thought it was a problem with the brain triggering fear/threat when eye contact is made.

http://blog.plantpoisonsandrottenstuff. ... autistics/

I think that makes sense, when my sister was younger she'd scream when someone even looked at her.

...

Could it be that most of us have a hard time "reading" facial expressions and emotions and that there is really no point in it? Just a thought.
I know when I do make eye contact I get nothing out of it. It's just for the other persons sake.

As I remember, there was short period when I was younger (about 16 years old), it was about a pair of weeks, when I really liked to watch into people eyes (usually, till now, I avoid looking in the eyes). But I did it in some strange way, maybe too direct, because many people said: Hey, stop this, you are looking too deep in me!
So I stopped, because it was uncomfortable for both sides. I had feeling, that my contact with the person I speak with was too direct and too close. It was for me like an experiment, and then I returned to my common way of not-looking in the eyes.

I think for me, at least, it's part lack of attention span, and part sensory overload and a little something else. The few times where I made an effort to look people in the eyes, I seem to concentrate to hard. I start to imagine that there is a long and thin piece of graphite coming from my eyes into theirs. I then think that if I look away, it will break, causing great pain and even blindness in myself. So of course I won't blink and I just stare into someones eyes, then I begin to get self conscious as I stare, I begin to worry that maybe I look like I am going to attack them, but I still can't break the stare. The other person has to break the eye contact. It's pretty much torture for me.

It doesn't invoke the fight or flight reflex in me. I think it's part sensory overload and part lack of attention span for me. It's just such an interesting symptom.

As far as I know, making eye-contact with other animals is a threatening action. I am curious to know if all humans think that eye contact is a sign of respect and paying attention, or if a culture somewhere finds it offensive and rude.

i also wonder the same why do i have trouble with eye contact.

Good question, I don't know the answer.

However, it can be quite a Eurocentric or North American/caucasian-centric proposition.

I remember fluffing an internal job interview for a role in an organisation where I was already working, and I didn't get the permanent job, even though I was covering the role as a 'temp'. Anyway, a colleague gave me a book about interview skills, to help me overcome my difficulties, and I remember reading something about eye contact and cultural differences. It was talking from the perspective of the interviewer, and it mentioned something about taking into account cultural differences, along the lines that from a European/caucasian perspective, direct eye contact is a sign of someone being straightforward and honest, whereas looking away can be interpreted as being shifty or dishonest, so a European/caucasian candidate might look an interviewer in the eye as they answer questions...

Whereas from an Afro-Caribbean perspective, direct eye contact can be perceived to be aggressive, so people of that ethnic background would tend not to look an interviewer in the eye as they answered questions, and of course if their interviewer was European/Caucasian, this body language/non-verbal communication might be negatively perceived. (It was a long time ago, and it was a book for the UK job market).

I've just Googled cultural differences eye contact and come up with a reference stating that in Asian cultures, direct eye contact can be disrespectful.

So who knows what it's all about, and how cultural differences might come into play...

perhaps people from Afro-Caribbean backgrounds might be under-diagnosed or misdiagnosed, if cultural differences dictate that they tend not to engage in direct eye contact?

Anyway, as for the other visual stuff, I have mild prosopagnosia but otherwise very good eyesight. There doesn't seem to be a predominant visual quirk that's common to a majority of Aspies, although it's not unusual for Aspies to be affected in some way by one of them.