Autistic Eye Contact: Reflections from a Neurodiverse Home

Autistic eye contact

There are many ways I would have parented my daughter differently had I known. This is one of the laments I have about her receiving a late diagnosis (not as late as 37, but from a child development perspective, 11 is still late). From 2-7 years old, she was a bundle of energetic nerves. She was an energetic, sensory-seeking, safety oblivious child who needed a bit of feedback. When I would give her feedback she would turn her head in the opposite direction with a special kind of spice. I used to tell her to "look me in the eyes". In my mind, this was a sign of respect and it is how I knew she was listening to me and taking in my words. I now realize I assumed all of these things because I’d absorbed cultural messages about eye contact. I’d learned eye contact = respect, and eye-contact = attention. What I know now about autistic eye contact, and wish I had known then is that she was working to regulate your tiny, energetic body in these moments. What I interpreted as spice and sass were her desperately trying to hold onto herself.

Forcing Eye Contact Impacted My Family

Her lack of eye contact triggered a narrative for me about being disrespected, which triggered my big emotions (being disrespected was a raw spot for me as an undiscovered Autistic). Thankfully, even without autistic awareness, I had enough training under my belt to generally be able to deal with these emotions and difficult moments well enough. But goodness, it was hard, and I understand why multigenerational trauma happens in ND families. Our traits clash, and we trigger each other’s stuff. When we don't have the language for this; it takes on a life of its own and becomes a big, chaotic mess that no one understands. But neurodivergent multigenerational processes are not the intention of the post-eye contact. So back to eye contact. 

What I wish I had known about my daughter in those moments is that she felt intense shame (thank you rejection sensitivity dysphoria) and was working to regulate her tiny body by avoiding eye contact with me during these moments. What I interpreted as disrespect was actually her attempt to hold onto herself in a difficult moment. What I would do to be about to return to these moments and have a redo— if I got a redo, I'd sit side by side with her, provide her with something to fidget with, and have the conversation, no eye contact required.

So here is the thing about eye contact—it dysregulates us, and our amygdalas go haywire, and we quickly become sensory overloaded in the face of it. But let's zoom out a bit and start by explaining what amygdalas are.

What’s an Amygdala? And What Does it have to do with Eye Contact?

The amygdala is the emotion center (or fear center) of the brain. Our amygdala lights up and prepares us for action (fight, flight, freeze, or fawn) when we feel threatened. The research on the activation of the amygdala during social contact has been mixed for Autists--with some research showing less amygdala activation and other studies showing more. However, this is likely due to the fact many of us avoid eye contact. The Monk et al., 2010 study took a closer look at the amygdala activation during social encounters to understand this variance. Their research found that when attention to eyes was controlled for, the Autistic person had more amygdala activation than the general population. When attention is the same (meaning the Autistic and control spend the same amount of time looking at the face), amygdala activation is greater. This study found that time spent fixating on eyes was associated with greater amygdala activation. Breaking eye contact is a way that many Autists regulate. This is consistent with other studies that have demonstrated more amygdala activation during eye contact (Dalton et al, 2005). Thus, it could be hypothesized that studies showing reduced amygdala activation may be capturing Autistics that are more frequently avoided eye contact. This may be one of the reasons Autists frequently look away, as it likely serves to self-regulate and self-soothe.

We Regulate our Bodies by Avoiding Eye Contact

Y'all, this is a significant finding-it means we literally look away to regulate our brains. In the same way, an allistic person may take a deep breath to activate their relaxation response and regulate their bodies; we regulate our bodies by avoiding eye contact and strategically looking away.

Another interesting finding to emerge from Monk et al., 2010 research is that when looking at faces/interpreting facial expressions, the autistic brain showed a stronger connection between the amygdala and prefrontal cortex, meaning more prefrontal cortex involvement. And the connection between the amygdala and temporal lobe (temporal lobe plays a role in processing emotions/identifying facial cues and other more visual perceptions) was weaker. This finding is consistent with my clinical observation that Autistics are much more likely to analyze their way through the world than feel (temporal lobe) their way through it. This finding is consistent with many Autistic descriptions of analytically deducing meaning from facial expressions (vs. emotionally registering on a more automatic level). When attention bias to emotional faces was equivalent between Autists and control groups, Autists were associated with greater amygdala activation.

The Consequences of Forcing Eye Contact

Teaching children to force eye contact is teaching them it is more important to follow typical social norms than to regulate their bodies. When we do this, we are teaching children to override their body’s need to regulate, and then turn around and tell them to "calm down" when this causes them anxiety and stress. In psychology, we might call this a "double bind" (when you put someone in an impossible situation where either way, they are set up to disappoint the other). By asking our Autistic kids (and adults) to be calm and regulated AND follow NT communication strategies, we invite them to exist in a double bind. Enforcing eye contact for children and adults, even in the name of "professionalism," is not neuro-inclusive practice.

Conclusion

My daughter popped downstairs and asked what I was working on while I was writing this post. I gave her a brief synopsis, and then we joked, "maybe instead of encouraging you to take a deep breath when you're upset, I'll start encouraging you to close your eyes." Autistic children and adults regulate their bodies differently. Closing our eyes, reducing the sensory, averting our gaze-these are powerful ways we regulate our bodies. Deep breathing can be good for us too, but my goodness, averting the gaze of the other may be one of the most profound gifts we can give ourselves when we are looking for ways to hold onto ourselves.

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