Eye contact: judgements

I’ve been struck by how strongly ingrained the judgements that are made of people who don’t make eye contact are in western cultures. The number of people who throughout my life have unashamedly told me of their own, or  of a friend’s initial (negative) reaction to me which has (by their own admission) been entirely based on my failure to make eye contact.

 

These situations have, as far as I can grasp, been based on their not knowing/realising/noticing that I have some kind of visual impairment that might make eye contact impossible. When it is explained, they will generally withdraw the judgement, but often with a qualifying justification like:

“I didn’t realise, I thought you were a bit weird not looking at me properly”,

“I didn’t realise, I thought you were a bit tight up/shifty not looking at me properly”,

“Oh right, I thought you were a bit closed off not looking at me properly”,

“Really, I just thought to myself, what the fuck’s he looking at, his eyes are going all over the place”

And so on.

 

A few things come out of this for me.

While the information that I can’t see enough to make eye contact is (as far as I know) accepted, the implication is always there that, if I could, those judgements would be entirely justifiable.

 

How horribly all this must impact on people who can see, but whose mental health, neurological make-up, past trauma, general disposition, or even their shyness means that they   don’t or can’t routinely make eye contact with strangers.

 

Such fixed views that have, I imagine, largely been constructed by western psychology, must also open the doors to multiple cultural misunderstandings with people from those (non-western) cultures that view the making of eye contact as disrespectful.

 

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