Eye Contact (research question)

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There is a certain for me when it comes to eye contact. I can paint the most intense eyes ever in my portraits and a lot people comment on it.

When I look at the people it is overwaelming to just looking at them in the eyes because I am studying not just the irises and cornea of the person. I can see how many shades of color the iris has and honestly humans are uninteresting to look at. It is not a sign of trust or truthfulness most people think. A scam can look a person into the eyes and flat lie to them. I can not sense the emotions in the eyes for me just a biological function that people use to see.

Thank you everyone for all the replies so far. This is very helpful.

I would like to add something to my original questions, for those who don't mind sharing. Some of you have it on your profiles or signatures, but some do not: what type of autism do you have? High-functioning or low-functioning? And do you consider yourself generally hypersensitive, or hyposensitive? Are any of you answering this question non-verbal?

I will have to do some research into autistsic hyposensitivity when I get to that point in my book. I am extremely hypersensitive, so I don't know much about hyposensitivity. My general impression is that higher-functioning people tend to be hypersensitive, and lower-functioning people tend to be hyposensitive. Is that correct, or is it more complex than that? While my book will be primarily focused on high-functioning autism, I will definitely add notes on lower-functioning types as well, so it's important that I understand the distinction better.

Also, I'm simply interested. : ) Thanks a lot, and keep the information coming. I'll take some time later today to start properly organizing and sorting it. Eventually I will probably ask some of you if I can quote you in the book (this will be a ways down the road though).

I chose "other" because multiple reasons apply. I normally don't think to make eye contact in the first place. Beyond that, I find that eye contact can be very intense, and when I try and make eye contact, it's all I can think about. When I look at faces, I stop listening to what the other person is saying and start studying their facial features instead.

I just find eye contact to be highly distracting. I look at someone's eyes, focus on the fact that I'm staring into their eyes, and completely stop paying attention to what they were saying, or I stop talking. I can't talk and make eye contact at the same time. When I'm speaking, I'll turn my whole head away from the person to look at the wall, floor, ceiling, decoration in the room, anywhere but forward. When the other person is talking, I can usually fake it by watching their mouths, but if they like to gesture a lot with their hands, then I watch those instead. This has lead to at least one friend asking me why I'm afraid of hands, presumably under the assumption that I was watching them for fear of his lashing out and hitting me. I explained that my problem is not with hands, it's with eyes.

I think the answer alternatives doesn't cover all possibilities. In Aspie Quiz, avoiding eye contact correlates highly with being accused of staring, indicating there is a link. My hypothesis is that much of eye contact avoidance is based in using too much or inappropriate eye contact.

As above, not exactly not interested. I just don't get any information from faces beyond what i have learned by looking at picture cards for emotional facial gestures. There is no info there so no reason to look there. For me it's a learned thing. You should spend about half time looking at eyes, a quarter at mouth, and a quarter elsewhere. (head in general, or hands etc...) That was basic guideline given to me by my psych anyhow.

Though I have absolutely no detrimental or discouraging factors for face/eye gaze. I just don't really get any subconscious clues that I am aware of to the emotional/cognitive state of my conversational partner.

My official diagnosis is PDD NOS - not that the diagnosis provides any useful information about me.



High to medium functioning. I met my infant milestones early or on time, and by the age of 5 I could use the word 'prehensile' correctly in a sentence (I was fascinated by the South American rain forest). I'm now an undergraduate university student, but I can't live independently - I forget to eat, I can't clean, I've had a lot of difficulty learning how to do laundry, etc.



Mostly hypersensitive. Sense by sense:

Touch - hypersensitive
Hearing - hypersensitive
Vision - a mix of hypo and hypersensitive (I often don't see things right in front of me, but anything flashing or sparkly grabs my attention and can either fascinate or overload me depending on my mood)
Smell/Taste/Oral Tactile - picky eater, not sure exactly which sense(s) causes this
Balance - hyposensitive
Propriocetion (feeling of where your body is in space) - hyposensitive
Interoception (feeling internal body sensations such as hunger) - hyposensitive
External pain - hypersensitive



I'm very verbal, myself.

I'm high functioning and generally hypersensitive.

I avoided eye contact because I thought it was impolite and rude. I'm not sure if this was because I'm on the spectrum or because I was abused a lot as a child.

I've also notice I avoid eye contact with a person if I am angry at them.

BTW, I've noticed I'm back to avoiding eye contact every so often. I'm not sure why it's intermittent. I did it as a youngster then learned not to do it as an adult. Why it's sometimes back now is a mystery to me.

I am high functioning to medium functioning. I had no delay in language and learned to read fairly early (which is good since books are my obsession). Currently I am attending college and my language skills/verbal comprehension rank in the 98th percentile with my vocabulary off the charts (wechsler's intelligence scale). However my sensory and executive functioning issues make it very difficult for me to be independent.

I don't avoid eye contact as much as I find it distracting. If I look someone in the eyes I will end up analyzing their iris colour instead of paying attention to the conversation. Sometimes I even get accused of starring. One case when I was nine stands out. I was sitting in my own row on a plane (my parents were two rows behind me). The plane got into some turbulence and I was on the verge of a meltdown. To keep myself from freaking out I analyzed the eye colours of everyone in my row. Later I told me father all about the slight colour variations I saw and he dismissed it as weird on my part. So I generally only make a little eye contact to avoid being distracted and/or seen as weird.

I have high-functioning autism with childhood language delay, and I am social hyposensitive and sensory hypersensitive.

Sometimes I´m ok with it, sometimes not. I never liked too much eye contact at too close range. I like eye contact to be "casual" in most cases and tend to look away when thinking out the next sentence.

I am High Functioning and Hyper Sensitive. If I may suggest if researching Eye-Contact you might be back up by the Human Resources. I mean for eye contact is critical for successful job interview and a many job coaches tried to train me in this. I think many us have the same experience when to right kind of eye contact. Have you ever question why there is high unemployment in ASD. It ties in to maintaining the right kind of eye contact under the ADA. Human resources have to allow See Eye Dogs, Wheelchairs and what not for other disabled community. Many HR people said eye contact critical for their job.

It's uncomfortable, awkward, creepy, intimidating, overwhelming and everything else not enjoyable. I cannot stand looking in someone's eyes or when they look in mine. I am autistic, but it's not easy to say severely, high functioning or moderately because there are so many areas where I fall in between. I cannot say anything more than 2 or 3 words and they are very laboured and fragmented, I never know when to take break, my coworkers have to let me know and we have to take break together (I wouldn't know when to go back in even with a watch), I cannot read people or understand verbal instruction to save my life, yet I can program and operate CNC lathes and use manual lathes also, which probably makes me high(er) functioning. The papers say high-functioning, so I guess that's where I fall.

Eye contact feels too intimate for me, in a really wrong way, and I find it difficult to do. I do try to though, but it is a struggle. At its worst, I feel as though I am getting sucked into their eyes like some vortex and I need to break away from it asap!

There are a few reasons:

1. When my mother was still alive, she always warned people that if her eyes started to shine, watch out, because she had a hair-pin trigger on her temper. I could never see it. My brothers and I learned really quick how to bob and weave, since she had a very wicked left upper-cut.

2. When Dad was still alive, the few times I looked into his eye, he would be making a first-class jackass out of me.

3. Most of the time, I can't see what is in the other person's mind.

4. The few people that I can see in the eye of their mind, I get quite scared. I can't tell if they're telling the truth, or what they're thinking.

5. I also been having problems lately decoding obvious social cues, so what make you think I can figure out the hidden cues?