"The Asperger's Stare"

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I've been told by an NT person who is close to me that I have an unsettling stare.
Furthermore, she has told me that she's noticed the exact same stare in other people on the autistic spectrum. She characterizes it as a fixed, empty gaze, that appears cold and unfeeling, almost not-human. She says that it makes her feel uncomfortable, creeped-out, etc.

I recently checked out the book Pretending To Be Normal by fellow aspie, Liane Holliday Willey, and it has her picture on the back. I showed the book to my NT friend, and she looked at the picture of the author and said, "Oh my god! It's that stare!! !"

Just today, I looked at myself in the mirror, and I swear I saw what she meant.
There is a quality in my eyes that is haunting, as if the "ME" is missing... it is somewhere lost in my brain, but not present and engaged through my eyes. If the eyes are the window to the soul, then I begin to wonder about the nature of my soul... (not really, just an expression)


Anyways, how do you feel about this?
Do you think that Aspies have a characteristic stare?
Has anyone ever commented on your gaze or the looks you give?

Thanks for your replies!

Do you have a picture of this stare?

I stare at fixed points while thinking. I zone out and am purely internalised when this happens - which is very often - and I am certainly impervious to human connection. I am self "absorbed" and i am thoroughly, beautifully and happily engaged with my own internal workings... and those around me detest and loathe it.

"there she goes...she's gone..." they say at home.
"gone. not home."

home to myself. not to them.

I don't have that stare, nor have I seen it on the other people on the autistic spectrum I have met.

i go to an aspie group 1x per month, out of 25 people mabe 4 have that look , thru my life people have always commented about my eyes, when i was younger i iused to think something was very wrong with my eyes ,ihad heard there was an operation people were having their eye fibers cut on the edges to change their eyes apearence i remember wanting that surgery..my last girlfriend told me i had the ability to rob her soul with my eyes, i guess she got tired of living with a thief,truth be told if these eyes see the face iknow everything, if they focus on the eyes in the face its more or less a spiritual matter, the eyes truely are the window to the soul but its the third eye, the brain stem, the tisra til were all the real action takes place

It sounds like several aspies I know, I think. do you have a picture?

The lack of facial expression does it (this comes under nonverbal cues).

I've been told that I have a "cold, sinister stare" or a "hard stare".

I don't believe it's because we have an absence of a "souls", but that we're so submerged in our own worlds of obsession that we're never completely present in the outer world.

The eyelids especially. A person who simply has perpetual wide eyes could come across as vacant, even when they really aren't.

Nonverbal social ques are far from infallible, even for NT's from what I can gather.

The back cover can be seen on amazon. She just looks kind of distant or thoughtful to me.

I generally don't look people in the eyes, or even notice what their eyes are like. But if I notice somebody staring at me and feel the need to to look directly back at them, they often find my look unsettling, or even disturbing, without me intending to upset them in any way. Since I have no desire to make people uncomfortable, I mostly try to avoid looking at them with a fixed gaze.

It is fine for someone to explain that your look makes them uncomfortable, but to describe it as NOT-HUMAN?! Please - give me a break! That is nasty and uncalled for in my view. I suspect that many of us may have a DIFFERENT look in our eyes, that doesn't make us sinister, or diminish our souls in any way.

Since I started reading this board I am taken aback by how much negativity about themselves many AS people here seem to be willing to swallow.

People have commented on how my eyes are creepy...NTs in school have called me names like CrazyEyes

Last edited by Tory_canuck on 20 Jun 2009, 4:28 am, edited 1 time in total.

From what I've heard from a few people, some aspies don't make eye contact, others do it oddly or with a stare like gaze.
Like I mentioned in another thread, I've been told I stare at people as if I'm looking through them. As if they're transparent. A friend once decribed perfectly what others have been trying to explain. That I give people the 1000 mile stare, like I'm a vietnam vet with shell shock.
I've also been told I'm creepy mainly because of the way I stare at people during conversation. And once was even called a sociopath, because this person said my eyes were "dead" and "emotionless" and that you can tell a lot about a person by their eyes.

god I have the stare, good more scaring Ts muhahhahahaha I will change my pic to my stare

I just looked at the back cover of the book you mentioned, and I don't get it.
She looks normal to me. Maybe a bit awkward, but that could be because she's posing in front of a camera.

I don't detect any type of weird/typical stare:\


People say I always look angry or lost when I look out in front of me.
And when I talk to them I either have an angry look on my face (unless I'm deliberately smiling) or I look at them like I don't believe what they're saying, or, at the least, I look like I'm very critical of what they're saying (which isn't true, but that's what it looks like).