why don't autistic children make eye contact?

[mamaLou13]

can you guide me to a reputable website or book which explains this in some detail by any chance?

My dd who is possibly on the spectrum usually has good eye contact, but her gaze sometimes wonders to past my face or somewhere else on my face. I think that's more a problem with her attention rather than her feeling uncomfortable. My boyfriend used to have really bad eye contact and would look up practically all the time. I now know why. He was incredibly insecure and the more vulnerable he felt in a conversation, the less eye contact her gave, which sounds pretty obvious I suppose. I should point out that i'm pretty sure he's somewhere on the spectrum too. His dad has very poor social skills, but his mum is the one with very bad eye contact. She hardly ever looks at me in the eye. She will either look completely past me or at my cheek, or she'll do the complete opposite and will get too close and look very intense when talking to me. I still find it quite hard to ignore even after 8 years.

It's weird that you only start to notice these things when you start worrying about your dc.

Oh and I should point out that my boyfriend/fiance is dd's dad. Thought it was an important point to make genetics wise.

Very very interesting. DS makes eye contact but shows other traits, but I have kind of discounted them recently.

I tend to look at lips/look away as eye contact makes me nervous, but as far as I am aware am not on the spectrum (though have sensory seeking tendencies and am terribly over sensitive to smells). Do you have to be on the spectrum to avoid eye contact? I am great at empathy, though....

mrs, no I don't think that not being great with eye contact automatically means you're on the spectrum. Having said that, I do think we're all on the spectrum to a greater or lesser degree, but most of us don't have significant enough traits that it affects our day to day life. I'm very sensitive to smells too and suffer with anxiety. There are plenty of people out there who would just get away with being quirky or a little odd, but if they were assessed they may very well be on the spectrum but it wouldn't necessarily do them any good because it's not affecting their day to day lives. I personally have met lots of people who would come under that catagory.

I do wonder if my 'problems' with maintaining eye contact is a learnt behaviour. Neither of my parents can do it either (I think they are both undiagnosed AS), so I never had it modelled to me as a child.... I remember having my photos taken at my wedding and the photographer wanted one of me and my dad looking at each other - so so very awkward!

There was an interesting thread about the 'dance of communication' and eye contact, maybe Amber light posted it. I think it was an analysis of eye contact by the anthropologist Desmond Morris.

Mrs I def think my ds problems with eye contact are learned: first being ill as a baby and missing all that pre verbal communication, then dh and I being oblivious for so long. We are trying to train him now aged 5. We wait for him to make eye contact before responding. He knows what to do but it doesn't come naturally.

Speechmark has published a book/manual on non verbal communication that I'm minded to order.

I thought it was a bit of a myth that children on the ASD spectrum don't make eye contact. Both the children I know in RL with an ASD diagnosis make good eye contact, as does my DD who is currently undergoing assessment.

If my DS has never met you before or if you suddenly appear in a room he will stare right through you to the back of your head. As do I. It can be creepy at times.

However if I am telling him off or explaining something interesting to him or he is having a sensory boost like a fairground ride, his eyes go right up into his head.

If I am at a meeting I have to look at the skirting board or the rope bit of the blind past someones head to be able to take in word for word what someone is saying.

was going to add though when he is relaxed in play with me or his sister his eye contact is normal so it varies.

Some people with autism have multiple vision - so they see 100 faces not 1 and that makes looking someone in the eye quite confusing. The faces may not be stationary to look at either which can make someone with autism feel quite sick. (I can only imagine it's like when your drunk and can't focus - sorry that's the best comparison I can think of)

Sometimes, as mentioned above it's a sensory overload. So they can look or listen.

I do have pupils who have severe autism who can and do give eye contact. Usually when we/I are doing something which they can relate to. For example intensive interaction where we are imitating the pupil and they can relate to us as oppossed to us forcing them to understand our world iyswim? It's often when they want our attention not the other way round!

Ds1 (severely autistic) has excellent eye contact. It was his main from of communication for many many years (he's non-verbal). He's particularly good at using eye contact to tease.

He isn't very good at following eye gaze or using it responsively, but if he wants to communicate with eye haze he has no problems at all. He is very like sphil's ds actually - they use their eye contact in similar ways.

coff, my dd does exactly the same when meeting strangers. For example we went to the dentist for the first time yesterday and she walked into the room and was looking right through her. I could tell the dentist was a little unsettled and kept asking dd if she was ok. I think when my dd is nervous/anxious, she sort of shuts down. She's actually very good at self soothing(most of the time), so I think that's why she has unusual eye contact in those situations- to almost calm herself. One woman actually said "earth to " because dd was looking straight through her. I know it's just ignorance and there's not bad intent, but I still felt very protective and was really quite cross. Luckily dd was too young at the time to understand what she meant anyway.

Eye contact: (info from a brain scientist, so don't blame me if it's dodgy. And I will be generalising, as we're all different (as we can see from some responses above)).

In most people, eyes make contact with other eyes....and it might be a predator about to eat us...so their brains send the signal to the most ancient bit of the brain, the amygdala (wiggly bit in the middle of the brain). It identifies whether it's a predator or not by asking the other bits...and if it is, it presses the "Hell, Panic! Run!" button and the brain prepares for extreme frightening attack. If the other bits of the brain say those are the eyes and face of a friend, then it relaxes, and lets the people-bit of the brain take over with its whole "Hi, welcome, friend!" sequence, including the eyebrow raise greeting (people always do this when they see a friend - watch it!), the smile, instant recall of info about them etc.

In our brains, it sends the eye-contact signal to the amygdala, and there it stays, pressing the "Hell, Panic! Run!" button the entire time we're looking into people's eyes. So, even if we know it's a friend, our brains are stuck with a bit that is pressing the "Run!! For goodness sakes run!!" button continually.

To talk to you, we have to look away. It's not rudeness. Yes, we can be trained to look into eyes and just be scared witless doing so and learn to carry out a conversation whilst scared witless, but for the life of me I can't think what we'd gain from that. People don't complain that Blind people can't make eye contact, for example.

So, that's the 'why'. Exceptions apply.

DS(23) says he feels people's eyes are drilling right into his head.

He has also been dx'd face-blind and can't always recognise people he knows quite well. Psych says he recognises people by their overall 'shape', so if someone changes their hairstyle he has to check they are actually who he thought they were.

DS says he also recognises people by their clothes i.e. someone wearning a dress/skirt must be female so he narrows them down from that.

I can't stand making eye contact. Interviews are a nightmare for me. I know I should make eye contact and try to but can't sustain it. Then I feel the person I'm talking to will think I'm lying because not making eye contact is perceived as 'shifty'. So I try harder to do so and immediately lose my train of thought......

'Tis a nightmare!

I dislike eye contact when I'm speaking. DS dislikes making eye contact too, AFAIK neither of us is on the AD spectrum, but I'm trying to teach DS that its polite to look at peoples foreheads or noses or cheeks. Which is basicly how I get round it.

I always thought that I had really good eye contact, but thinking about it, i'm not sure I really do.

I can look someone straight in the eye, but not for long. If I do it for a long time I actually start feeling quite dizzy and I almost lose focus, so my eyes start darting around between their eyes and the rest of the room. My BIL told me that I do a lot of blinking when i'm looking at someone. I don't know, maybe that's a way of sort of shortening the time i'm looking at someone in the eye

I find it really interesting actually. Especially when you look back at your family and you can see that it runs through it. My dp used to look anywhere but the person he was talking to, but after much reminding from me he's now comfortable to give eye contact. So I think his was more learnt behaviour from his mum, rather than something he couldn't control. I mentioned his mum before, but just realised that she also does the looking up into her head when she's feeling like she's done something silly or wrong. It always stood out to me because it made her look like a little girl being told off. I always thought it was dp's dad who was DEFINITELY on the spectrum, but i'm wondering if actually it's both of them, but in very different ways.

Also, I was talking about all this to my mum yesterday and she said that my dad doesn't give eye contact very often and I can't believe I never noticed it. Well I did I suppose, but just thought that that's what dad does. You can see he feels very exposed and he will(unnecessarily) rub his eyes constantly when he does attempt it.