By Cynthia Parkhill
If asked to name the piece of advice that a person is most often given toward more effective public speaking, it would be: look people in the eyes.
As someone for whom eye contact does not always come entirely naturally, I have mixed feelings about placing so much importance upon looking people in the eye. During some exchanges it is comfortable to do so but during others that is not the case.
In other words, the eyes don”t always have it.
I agree that making brief eye contact can help build rapport between a speaker and his or her listeners but having to maintain steady eye contact with a single other person can be a daunting prospect. And there are cultures and situations when eye contact is not the best move.
For example, the website “Underground Etiquette ? How to get by on the Underground” at http://victorian.fortunecity.com/finsbury/254/tuberules.html quotes Andrew Martin, writer of the weekly “Tube Talk” feature in ES magazine: “It is absolutely not acceptable to make eye contact on the Tube. If God had meant us to look at our fellow traveler, he would not have invented the ?Evening Standard.””
My husband advised me that at a public dance hall, where dancers are expected to change partners after every dance, a person should not make eye contact with another person unless he or she is willing for that person to approach and request a dance.
So what does it mean when a person does not make eye contact with you? Maybe they are deliberately snubbing you in that blatant and visible way that I imagine people doing to each other when I read about the “cut” in Regency novels.
Brewer”s Phrase and Fable on Bartleby.com has catalogued four types of cuts:
“(1) The cut direct is to stare an acquaintance in the face and pretend not to know him.
“(2) The cut indirect, to look another way, and pretend not to see him.
“(3? The cut sublime, to admire the top of some tall edifice or the clouds of heaven till the person cut has passed by.
“(4) The cut infernal, to stoop and adjust your boots till the party has gone past.”
Read more at http://www.bartleby.com/81/4523.html.
But there are other reasons why a person may not look you in the eyes. They may come from a culture where locking eyes would be a sign of disrespect or challenge. Or a person may feel anxiety or have a developmental disorder.
A person may not meet your eyes because he or she is deep in thought.
The point I would like to leave with readers is that while eye contact is important in many situations that they may encounter, it is by no means universal. When a person whom you think ought to, is not looking you in the eye, there may be different factors at play.
What to you may seem disrespectful may, to the other person, be deferential reverence and respect ? or perhaps by sparing himself or herself the effort of trying to look at you, your listener is better able to give you undivided attention.
Cynthia Parkhill is focus publications editor for the Record-Bee. She can be contacted at rbinfocus@gmail.com. or call he directly at 263-5636 ext. 39.
