Eye Contact

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I'm having a bit of trouble with eye contact. When someone is talking to me I can't help but look at their face and all I see is the face just moving I don't really feel that much emotion when doing so and I get the feeling that they think I'm staring at them. Any tips?

I had the same problem. But I practiced, practiced, practiced over time.... it got a lot better. Not perfect, but it takes people at least a month to realize I am abnormal now.

One famous trick is to look not right into their eyes, but at a point right between their eyes. They don't realize you're not making eye contact, just brow-contact

Get used to it? No, here is how I am starting to work on eye contact.

1. Observe from outside the conversation the way normal people use eye contact.

2. Try to time the length that one looks the other in the eye before glancing away.

3. Do this throughout their conversation to get some kind of average of seconds of eye contact.

4. Do this on several conversations to get even a more accurate measurement.

5. Do this casually without getting caught the persons involved in conversation.

6. Apply the average number of seconds before glancing away in my own conversations.

If I do not like the fact that you do not make eye contact, then that is my problem. It is not your problem. Every culture has different rules for making eye contact.

Who gets to make the rules about what is or is not appropriate eye contact? I doubt that we could form an "eye contact committee" with a bunch of NT people and come up with a universal set of rules for eye contact.

Still, your interest in following the correct protocols for eye contact demonstrates sensitivity to the NT community and their unusual little rituals.

I have the opposite problem; I can't make eye contact or even look at a person when I'm talking as it distracts me and throws me off. I've had parents and teachers tell me, "Look at me," and one of my college professors even went out of her way to exaggerate trying to put her face in my line of sight, which I noticed in my peripheral vision and was mildly disturbed by. When it's the other person doing the talking, I just watch the mouth moving, and they can't tell the difference. You might try that.

Well I try to do it as if i'm acknowledging what they are thinking and understand what they are saying but I got no clue, I can only go by their words and not how they are feeling. I don't know guys... all this effort and it amounts to nothing.

I am NT but when talking to my manager etc at work, I find eye contact uncomfortable. Funny, my mom who is also NT and very social has a hard time maintaining eye contact also, but that is more from self esteem issues. When talking to my manager, I look in her eyes for about 5-6 seconds at a time and then I look away for about 10 seconds. And repeat. I have worked continuously for about 20 years and I know that communication is an integral part of holding a job. People need to know that I understand their instructions and I need to be able to express my "findings" or explain information to my users (I am in IT).

I see it in my children too. If my 4yo ASD son makes a comment or request of his 6 yo NT brother, unless the younger brother gets in the face of his older brother, the older brother won't know that the question or request was directed to him. We are teaching my 4yo that he has to make sure he gets the persons attention if he expects to be heard. This comes in handy also when driving. Sometimes you need to make sure that the driver sees you and the only way to do that is through eye contact.

i tried for years to use eye contact properly. i was scolded as a child when i appeared to be disinterested in what others, especially authority figures, were saying. i was chided as a younger adult for the same.
as i get older, and even more so since my recent confirmation of self-diagnosis, i allow myself to stop making such great efforts to do what does not come easily and naturally for me. it took me many years of understanding myself to realize that maintaining eye contact was extremely taxing on my ability to truly concentrate and pay attention to those i'm communicating with.
since that "letting go" of trying to do what nt's do, when i do make eye contact, it is more meaningful and i feel at more peace with myself throughout the encounter.
i understand that in some circumstances one must maintain some semblance of eye contact. in those situations, i watch faces, look at the outer parts of eyelids, sometimes mouths.

practice does work, but can be cumulatively exhausting. give yourself time to mentally refresh yourself after each encounter!