Can your AS child make eye contact with you?

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Just wondering mine can with me but she can't make eye contact with other people. Is that normal with AS.

Yes.
From the way you worded your question, I cannot help but presume that your child is not Diagnosed with Autism.
It's also normal for shy children to not look in the eyes of people they'd categorize as unfamiliar.
While you're at it, teach him/her that you're also supposed to look at the musculature AROUND the eyes, and not the actual eyes.

YES and my son makes beautiful eye contact most of the time. When he is telling us a long rambling story he has shifting eye contact, but on the whold, he makes great eye contact, always has since a baby!

Yesterday somebody asked me the question with eye contact with caregivers which I had never thought or considered before. Actually alll signs for my daughter point to Autism and she is diagnosed with with it. However, she can look me and people close to her in the eye. Therapists are working with her to look her peers in the eyes as she has trouble with that.

Last edited by Gnomey on 25 Apr 2012, 11:01 pm, edited 2 times in total.

It sounds familiar to me. My son first made eye contact with nobody, then with me, then with my husband, and then recently started making it with other adults. I am not sure about other kids, though. He is seven.

I think some spectrum kids have little to no problem, some acclimate gradually, and some have to use tricks to fake it because it is too overwhelming.

it is like most indicators that are not central to the diagnosis. There is a lot of variance.

Of course my daughter CAN look me in the eye. Does she always? No.

I think there's a whole range of things that go into the eye contact/lack of eye contact issue that are different for each child.

I always thought my son, for instance, had very good eye contact because he looks at you often when he's talking to you - but then he looks up and to the right, like he's thinking. After a video consultation with a social worker, she pointed out that he spends most of his time in conversation looking like he's thinking and actually has very poor eye contact. However, he doesn't avoid eye contact because it bothers him - he avoids it because it distracts him.

I know other kids for whom eye contact seems actually painful - it's sort of a flight-or-fight thing, it's like they're being assaulted. Other kids just forget to look. I can see where in any of these situations, eye contact with someone familiar who you trust might be easier and might happen more often.

Yep, my son tells me that looking into peoples eyes feels like they are burning a hole through his head. He also can't concentrate very well when he looks into someones eyes. His teachers are always telling me he doesn't pay attention in class because he doesn't LOOK at them while they are lecturing. I have to explain to them the whole eye contact autism thing. Once I asked the teacher who was oppositional to the idea of autism and eye contact being related, do you want him to remember what you are saying or what your eyes are doing?

Well I have AS, and I have found I can make some eye contact with people close to me who I trust, but other then that its either extremely difficult or impossible. But yeah it's especially impossible if I feel intimidated in any way, it's like in those situations I don't need to feel even more vulnerable by giving them eye contact.

Teachers complained of that from me to, though my dad would have none of it because he always brought up that my grades were fine so . what was the problem? my mom sometimes almost got talked into having me put on meds or whatever but my dad would have none of it. But yeah not only might it feel like a hole is being burnt in my head if I make eye contact but I am even sensative to if someone is looking at me and that can create that feeling to.

He CAN. But he often doesn't. And when he does, it is usually fleeting. Just a millisecond. In the majority of the photos I have of him, he is looking off to the side or at the floor. Because he won't look at the camera even . . . or will only for a split second, not long enough to catch him!

LOL - it is funny, when looking at old family pictures, how rare it is to see either DH or I looking at the camera.

My daughter's lack of eye contact doesn't bother me at all. I do notice sometimes that others take note of it. But I think better when I am visualizing what I am thinking of and I think my daughter is the same. She seems to always be "seeing" or visualizing what she is thinking of...and I think a lot of nt's do this as well. A lot of times when someone is talking to me my mind is 3 steps ahead and it is easier to look away so I can "concentrate". Perhaps this is rude? I'm not known for my social niceties, I am more of a "let's get to the bottom line and skip over all the blah blah blah".

My 3 yo demands my attention and will hold my head so that I can look at him (he has done that for a very long time, probably so that he is guaranteed his share of attention). So with me, his eye contact can be pretty intense but it is regular for the rest of the immediate family. It's good to poor with extended family. He is still at home but once he starts school in July, I will have a better idea of how he relates to strangers (old and young).

I believe it all varies quite a bit. My son makes eye contact, but it is overly piercing.

I do think he holds it back more outside of the family, maybe because he knows he doesn't do it quite right for social standards.

Not a parent yet but I'm an autistic person and work with some autistic young people.
So if that's an interesting perspective for anybody...

I can make eye-contact when I want to and sometimes when I'm not thinking about it I will casually make eye contact on accident (like in a lecture with a professor). If can often times be really uncomfortable and distracting so when I'm focusing or talking about something important I'm less likely to make eye contact. If I can tell that someone (like a therapist) is trying to get me to look at them I won't.

I've always has an easier time with immediate family but I know that not the case for every child I see. I don't think it's abnormal for an autistic child to make more eye-contact with people they are more comfortable with but I'm just one autistic, not an expert.

Some kids I work with are stare-ers, they'll make eye contact and then some and a couple have never looked directly at my face. Unless it's interfering directly with something we're trying to do I don't ask them to make more/less eye contact. I know how much effort it takes and how stressful it is to be dragged outside your boundaries and I don't like putting them through that when the only gain is them appearing 'more normal'.

I think there is a lot of variation with eye contact behavior in autistic children but there is a common thread of it being different in some way from the typical allistic behavior.