More about eye contact

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I dunno. I've wondered about that, myself.

Maybe one, then the other, but I am not sure it matters...

I've found that looking in either eye is acceptable. A common mistake is looking between their eyes, this tends to give people the feeling that you're looking straight through them.

Indeed - look at either eye, and periodically look away and then back again - seems to work for me. The most important thing is don't stare.

I seem to be an all-or-nothing person. I either can't look at all or else I end up staring. Argh!

I tend to go the opposite way-- "Oh look! It's an airplane! It has wings, a tail, engines, wheels,..." I see the "whole" first and then immediately break it into parts.

Whoops .



Me too. If I am talking to someone, I tend to look up in the air or off to the side, or just stare at them. I've been working on modulating this with quick glances, which is what other people seem to do, but the timing also has to be right. When they look at you as they are speaking, it is good to return their gaze. When you are speaking, you don't need to look at them as much, the listener tends to do more of the watching than the speaker.



I believe that's the way most people see things.

For something so far away as an airplane in the sky, I can't usually see all the details, so I see it as a whole. Especially in spaces, though, like rooms, I will notice all the stuff on the desks and the desks and computers and windows, chairs, ect before taking in the overall layout, or even where the walls are.

Actually, that's the scenario I was thinking of -- I live a few miles from the airport so most of the time when I see an airplane it's small enough to lack detail unless I look closely. Having said that, though, my "deconstructing" vision still stands. When I see a car I recognize it as a car, but then immediately break it down. If I closed my eyes I might be able to tell you what rims it had but not how many doors or even what colour the paint was. I just fixate on the most significant aspect of whatever I'm looking at and ignore the rest. It may not be the Aspie/Autie way, but I doubt it's NT either.

I largely survive on my peripheral vision. When I enter a room I sweep it with an unfocussed gaze (without actually looking at anything) and let my peripheral vision take it all in. My peripheral vision has good 3D capability (which is apparently unusual) and I'm pretty good at identifying and remembering the things I see peripherally. That lets me build an object map quickly. The lack of focussed attention in the peripheral vision allows me to see more, faster. When I actually "look" with my core vision it fixates quickly on individual objects (although not neccessarily their parts). By the time I look at the desk, computer, windows, chairs, etc. I've already built a map of where they are so it's no great loss if I fixate on the pile of books on the corner of the desk. Much of my tendency to stare into space is to stop the fixating and give my attention level a chance to unwind.

FWIW, I do most of my driving peripherally. If I'm focussed on the car in front of me then I won't see the car in the lane beside me and vice-versa, but if I'm somewhat "zoned out" then my peripheral vision will bring me the "big picture" while still allowing me to maintain the proper speed and gap. The only thing I actually "look" at when driving are road signs and occasionally the speedo.

I had a hard time with Eye Contact when I was younger. the more gentle a person seemed, themore likely I was to look them in the eye. the more arogant someone appeared to be, the less likely I was to look them in the eye. I remember seeing my Dad as a horrible Monster who didn't accept peoples' differences. I looked him in the eye a little until he wanted me to sound exactley like the average North American. I just couldn't do it, anymore. I stopped looking at him as a punnishment for what he did. That went on until I started College. I was in a Vocational Training for adults with mild to moderate Disabilities, and there was a man that I was trying not to be like. That's when I started eye-balling people into the centre of their eyes. I didn't want anybody to see me as being weak.

Jetson, thanks to your great post, I think perhaps one day maybe I'll be able to drive. I wasn't sure how I would do it. What you said, though, makes sense.

Gotistix - thanks for the info. It makes sense.

I think the more that I can unfocus, and let everything in, without "knowing" or conciously focusing on it, the more big picture I will be ale to get. I hope.

I have problems with eye contact, too. My problem is that I stare at people, and make them uncomfortable I've been trying to work on this, but I can't work on the eye contact and listen to what the person is saying at the same time. That is unusual, because I am good at multitasking.

It still takes a lot of care, and of course there will bo lots of other minor things that steal my attention briefly (for example, the rear-view mirror). I have to be mindful that I don't start fixating on things as I drive. If the car ahead of me in the next lane has chrome rims that flicker as they spin then I have a hard time paying attention to what's going on right in front of me. Another problem is when there's something wrong up ahead -- the other night I was on the highway after dark on my motorcycle and I saw the flashing lights of some highway works trucks up ahead. I started trying to figure out which lane they were in and what they were doing to the road, etc. and then had to slam on the brakes to avoid driving right into the back of the car in front of me because everyone was slowing down and my attention was nowhere near my motorcycle. At least I can pass the time when I'm waiting at a red light -- I love to watch the wheels of the cars passing back and forth in front of me.

test

Last edited by Puzzler on 27 Apr 2005, 12:28 am, edited 2 times in total.

Wish it worked for me-- unfortunately, my peripheral vision is rather pathetic.

By the way, I'm talking about peripheral vision in the information-processing sense, not the "looking out of the corners of my eyes" sense. People generally see detail with their direct gaze and situational awareness (horizon, relative motion, colour, light sources) in their peripheral vision. The problem is that detail vision sometimes leads to tunnel vision. When I'm in a conversation and want to fake eye contact I look "through" people by not allowing my gaze to focus on their face. When I'm driving it's much the same thing -- I still want to look at where I'm going, but for the most part I un-focus my gaze enough to avoid registering needless detail. I don't *need* to read the license plate or bumper stickers on the car in front of me, but if I allow my vision to focus on his bumper that's exactly what I would end up doing. If I consistently look a short distance in front of the next car then I won't be able to see as much detail, and yet my peripheral vision skills (relative motion, light and colour) will still recognize his brake lights when they come on....

The good news is that this is a skill you can practise while walking with someone. Just walk a few paces behind while looking 10 or more feet in front of them.

Heheh, I've done this to win staring contests. (Among my friends, I am the staring contest champion, by the way ).

It never occured to me to put it to better use. Thank you for the advice, Jetson. I will give it a try and see if it works out. I'm a bit afraid of trying to drive using peripheral vision alone, however.

To be really safe you would need to combine many skills. One more way to avoid tunnel vision is to keep your head/eyes scanning back and forth (like the Cylons on the original Battlestar Galactica ) so that your gaze doesn't stop on any one place long enough to get fixated. It's much harder when I'm driving late at night and I'm tired -- my eyes just want to lock onto the taillights in front of me and stay there. Another thing I've noticed that breaks the spell is to tilt my head slightly to the side (10-20 degrees is enough). Disrupting the horizon makes reading much more difficult so I'm less tempted to latch onto the licence place ahead of me. Unfortinately, tilting the head can be a bit disorienting.

OK, I guess that makes sense. I'll have to try that next time I'm out driving-- one of my biggest issues is, in fact, that there are so many details that I can't keep track of them all.

Now if only I didn't have to focus on the speedometer to figure out how fast I'm going...