"The soul that can speak through the eyes can also kiss with a gaze" - Gustavo Adolfo Becquer
When I was
on a date a few weeks ago, my date made a very interesting comment that I
thought was completely strange. He said he liked that I made a lot of eye
contact. My first thought to this was, “Who the heck do you talk to? Making eye
contact is normal and what you’re supposed to do.” But then I remembered
another guy I dated a couple of years ago. He had the most trouble looking me
in the eye, and I did not trust him. Funny how such a common thing can be an indicator of so much.
Random Eye Contact
Fact #1: A comfortable amount of eye contact happens from 30% to 60% of the
time during a conversation – more when you are listening, less when you are
speaking.
Earlier
this year, I wrote about the importance of kissing in relationships (Kissing is Amazing), and I
think eye contact is just as important, if not more so. Mandy Len Catron wrote an article for the New York Times about an experiment she tried based off of psychologist
Arthur Aron’s experiment. Aron brought various pairs of strangers into a lab
and had them both answer 36 questions that became increasingly more intimate
and personal. Then, they had to stare into each other’s eyes for four minutes.
His goal was to produce love between two complete strangers, and six months
after the experiment two participants got married.
Random Eye Contact
Fact #2: In any type of relationship, the more eye contact that is exchanged,
the closer the relationship.
Catron
tried the same experiment with an acquaintance. They went to a bar to ask the
36 questions, and she describes forgetting that they were in a public place.
But even though they had revealed such personal things about one another, the
most intimate part came when they walked outside to a nearby bridge where they stared at each
other in silence for four minutes. About that experience, she says, “… I was
seeing someone really seeing me. Once I embraced the terror of this realization
and gave it time to subside, I arrived somewhere unexpected. I felt brave, and
in a state of wonder. Part of that wonder was at my own vulnerability and part
was the weird kind of wonder you get from saying a word over and over until it
loses its meaning…” And of course, she answers the real question – did they
fall in love?
Random Eye Contact
Fact #3: Both men and women find dilated pupils subconsciously more attractive,
because it signals that the other person finds them attractive. Women used to
use the juices from the belladonna plant as eye drops to make their pupils
appear bigger so that men would find them more attractive.
Yes they
did, but she doesn’t give the experiment all the credit. She says, “But what I
like about this study is how it assumes that love is an action… Arthur Aron’s
study taught me that it’s possible — simple, even — to generate trust and
intimacy, the feelings love needs to thrive.” She explains further that it is
common Western thinking that love and fate just happen to us, and we have to
wait around for it to happen. This study led them into a more deliberate
relationship, where it was more of a choice to be intimate rather than the
convenience of a situation or having things in common.
Random Eye Contact
Fact #4: We avoid eye contact in elevators and other cramped places as a way to
reduce the discomfort of our personal space being invaded.
A similar
experiment was conducted in 2010 by Robert Epstein during a presentation that
involved about a hundred New Yorkers. His goal was to show that “we could,
fairly easily and on demand, increase the love that people feel toward each
other—people who are already in love, people who are just friends, and even
total strangers.” Four volunteers came to the stage and were paired up and told
to gaze into each other’s eyes for two minutes. Before they began gazing, they
were asked to rate on a scale of 1-10 what they felt for the other person on
terms of liking, loving, closeness and attraction. After the experiment, they
were asked to rate it again, and the numbers went up for all four people.
Afterward, Epstein asked the entire audience to find someone to gaze at, and
then asked if they felt closer to this person. Nearly everyone did.
Epstein
explains why this phenomena occurs, and can even happen with total strangers:
Emotional bonds often get stronger
when people feel vulnerable, and this works for two reasons. First, when you
see someone who is in a weak and vulnerable state, you often feel like
comforting or protecting that person; those tendencies make you feel close to
someone, and they often bring you physically closer, too. Second, when you are
feeling vulnerable yourself, you might interpret your emotional state as a
loving one—especially if someone nearby happens to reach out to comfort you. If
two people feel vulnerable simultaneously, these two tendencies can interlock
and increase synergistically… The difference between mutual gazing and staring
is the consent; people are giving each other permission to invade their privacy
in way that is normally quite threatening.
Random Eye Contact
Fact #5: When we are sad, ashamed, or looking inward, we avoid contact, which
is why Catholic confessionals and psychiatric couches are arranged to attempt
to reduce the amount of contact between the priest or therapist and the
confessor or patient. It’s easier to open up when we sense but don’t actually
see others, and when they don’t or cannot stare at us.
Many
studies have shown how bonding eye contact is. The article, “The Look of Love:
the role of eye contact in human connection,” explains that it is believed prolonged
eye contact releases phenylethylamine, a chemical responsible for feelings of
attraction, and oxytocin, the chemical most associated with longer term bonding
and commitment. The article also points to an experiment by psychologist Zick
Rubin, which “found that couples who were deeply in love after several years
looked at each other 75% of the time while talking versus the average 30-60% of
the time.”
Random Eye Contact
Fact #6: Extroverts make more eye contact than introverts.
One way
that eye contact creates such an intimate bond is created through mirror
neurons in our brain. In the article, “Look ‘Em in the Eye: Part I – The
Importance of Eye Contact,” Brett and Kate McKay explain that when you are
feeling a certain emotion, such as sadness, the same neurons that light up in
your brain will also light up in the person who is watching you feel sad. This
is empathy. The mirror neurons of the person who is watching you are
activated by facial expressions and eye contact. Eye contact helps you to
really feel what someone else is feeling, thus creating a bond.
Random Eye Contact
Fact #7: Infants begin looking for eye contact at about 9-19 months.
How long
you maintain eye contact can even possibly determine “love at first sight,” or rather
the likelihood of experience deeper feelings. A study found, “a man who rated a
lady attractive held eye contact for about an average of 8.2 seconds, which
increased his chances of falling in love at first sight.” When a man held the
gaze for about 4.5 seconds, he was uninterested in the woman and/or did not
find her attractive. The same study found that women held eye contact for the
same amount of time with men they found attractive and ones they didn’t.
Random Eye Contact
Fact #8: Women make more eye contact than men. Interestingly, the higher
the levels of testosterone a fetus is exposed to in utero, the less eye contact
they make as infants—across genders. The exception to this rule are alpha male
babies, who have the highest levels of testosterone.
Eyes are
the window to the soul and the heart. So much has been studied about them, but
the biggest take away for me was from Catron’s New York Time’s article. She found that love is choice, but also acknowledges
that you can’t choose who you love or who loves you. There are a few things you
can choose, though. You can choose to be vulnerable, to create more intimacy,
to show interest, and to form a deeper bond. You can choose to do all this by
simply gazing into someone else’s eyes.
p.s. Six couples were asked to stare into each other's eyes for four minutes. It's worth watching: How to Connect With Anyone
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