On Eye Contact
24 Feb 10 by jeff
This was written in response to a discussion on training autistic children to maintain eye contact:
For many of us, the amount of eye contact we engage in has to do with sensory regulation. For instance, I often find myself being overwhelmed by the amount of information I receive after only a few seconds of eye contact.
I imagine you might get a sense of it if you were to confront a very angry, sad or miserable person and stare them in the eyes silently for 10 minutes from a foot away. Imagine the amount of information you might receive? Can you see how painful that might be? Many of us get more than we need in a moment of contact, and need to look away to avoid a discomforting flood of very intimate - and unnecessary - sensations.
My son was able to make much more progress in school when I explained to his teachers that he wasn’t ignoring them when he looked away - he was looking away so he could pay closer attention to what they were saying. Prolonged eye contact can often be so distracting that it makes it near impossible to actually listen to what is being said. Being flooded with intimate information can make the point of the discussion hard to isolate. Besides being very painful.
It can also feel like a very intense personal boundary violation. A very inappropriate intimacy - especially with strangers and those with power and authority.
When you see an autistic stare onto someone’s eyes, it usually means he’s trying to figure out what you really mean. Eye contact, in that case, often signifies confusion.
It can be counter-productive, and a bit cruel, to “train” a child to force eye contact.
Of course, your mileage may certainly vary, but people who stare at MY eyes tend to invoke an involuntary fear or loathing in me. And when they insist, the loathing sometimes stops being involuntary.
