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It's not that he's untrustworthy, it's just that he's thinking.
Whenever I’ve watched video of myself on TV, I think I look shifty-eyed. I’m asked a question and my eyes dart away from the camera into which I’ve been told to look. At the time, I don’t know I’m doing it, but I am.
Psychology professor Howard Ehrlichman of Queens College, City University of New York, has been studying eye movement since the 1970s. In a recent article in Current Directions in Psychological Science, he reviewed some of his work, including recent findings, and argued there’s robust evidence that I’m not being shifty-eyed at all. I’m just thinking. More specifically, I'm accessing long-term memory.
“There’s no way to prove this is universal,” Ehrlichman says. “But I can say that you can see it just by looking at people on TV, and in interviews. I am convinced it is universal.”
Ehrlichman is referring to saccades, rapid eye movements that disengage the focus of one’s vision, often moving down and away from, say, the eyes of a person to whom you are talking. Or a TV camera.
Over the years, there have been a number of seemingly logical explanations for the darting eye phenomenon. Humans place great importance on the eyes of others -- it’s part of how we determine friend from foe or intuit what others are thinking. Because this requires brain power and focus, many believe we have to disengage in order to direct our thoughts elsewhere. Another theory suggests that the direction of eye movement is related to the hemisphere of the brain we're accessing. That idea even showed up as a plot point in an episode of “The Mentalist.”
Sadly, Ehrlichman, says, “people in law enforcement do believe that,” and think they can tell if somebody is telling the truth or not. But during his work for his Ph.D. dissertation he found little evidence to support the idea.
In fact, Ehrlichman’s research shows that these eye movements have nothing at all to do with vision or hemispheres. He speculates the intermittent eye movements are an evolutionary holdover.
Most animals are what Ehrlichman calls “sensory/motor machines.” They are constantly scanning and reacting to the environment, looking for food, say, or trying to avoid danger. When they find what they are looking for, they fixate on it.
Our brain’s long-term memory is like an internalized landscape. We don’t need our eyes to scan it, but “our eyes go along for the ride,” Ehrlichman says, even if we’re not looking for anything visual.
Ehrlichman and his colleagues proved the saccades are unrelated to actual vision by putting people in dark rooms, alone. “We see this effect even if they have closed eyes and they have nothing to disengage from,” he says. “The pattern is the same as when people are sitting with their eyes open.”
In one experiment, subjects were asked to name things according to visual properties, like “green” or “triangular” versus naming words meaning the same as “pleasant.” The visually-related items like “green” evoked no eye movement. But when subjects searched their brain data banks for words matching pleasant, the saccades were obvious.
Similarly, when subjects were asked to visualize their living room and describe it, which you’d think would lead to lots of eye movement as they mentally scanned the room, there was virtually no saccade activity.
“We think once they retrieve the image, they can move through it without searching long-term memory,” Ehrlichman explains.
On the other hand, when an answer to a question is right in front of us, say if we’ve just rehearsed a Q and A, we don’t need to scan our internal memory landscape. We can pop out an answer to a question and maintain our focus.
So rather then being shifty, eye movements could actually mean somebody -- including yours truly -- is simply being thoughtful.
Brian Alexander (www.BrianRAlexander.com) is co-author, with Larry Young PhD., of "The Chemistry Between Us: Love, Sex and the Science of Attraction," (www.TheChemistryBetweenUs.com) to be published Sept. 13.
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Leave a Comment:
Well that's good to know! I look shifty-eyed too. I know that I'm not lying. I'm frantically trying to think of something to say because I'm uncomfortable and, in addition, I don't even like to look people in the eye. It all adds up to me looking totally suspicious when all I'm doing is trying to think of something to say in what to me is an awkward social moment...or nervous moment....or anxious moment. I do not interact well with people and after years of forcing myself to do so, I no longer need to and its a huge relief. No lie.
I tend to let my gaze drift when I'm retrieving an appropriate response to a question or composing a thought. Some people think I'm being evasive. No, just deep thinking. In fact, I wasn't even looking at the monitor when I was thinking about this comment.
This article is quite comical. I read one on here some time ago with that author claiming that those who shift their eyes to their right when answering a question were lying. Someone else comes up with some study, and there's no telling what they will claim it means. I think this author is probably correct. Also, I believe many shift their eyes as a primary aid, or part, of self expression.
I really wish the author had mentioned that persons with autism usually dislike making eye contact. Quite often adults with high functioning autism draw the suspicion of law enforcement for this reason. It doesn't even necessarily mean that the person wants to avoid socializing. Many WANT to socialize -- they just don't want to have to look at your eyes while they do it.
It's bound to be brought up. How many officials of our system, at any level, are there that don't have shifty eyes?
Are you saying I'm a natural and should run for a political office?? Hmmmmmm not a bad idea....
And I process all kinds of stimuli and cues and think others do too while I'm thinking. I tend to have an answer quickly, but if you asked me to describe my living room I would be looking around as if looking around the room. I think different people process differently and saying a person is lying because s/he looks this way or that way is oversimplifying the thought process.
I had a therapist who saw clients in a room overlooking a beautiful river. When I would think about what we were discussing I loved to look out over that water, and I remember later reading something about how if someone looks to the right when remembering something s/he is telling the truth, and to the left s/he is making it up. The river was to the left of where I sat telling the truth, and I remember wondering if she thought I was making things up. The micro expressions I think do mean something, as in sadness looks this way and real happiness that way, but since I might feel guilty that my child was hit by a car because I am his mother, I might not be feeling guilty about running over him myself. I think there are clues, but they are just pieces to consider and not the whole picture.
Yes, tlll, I can understand what you mean. I think we have to keep in mind that different people are just that...different...from each other.
Could it just be shyness or the person feeling nervous that causes the shifty eyes? I know I will get that way the minute there's a camcorder on me, but otherwise, I don't do it. I don't like to be stared at or gawked at though.
My mother-in-law was very caustic tongued and always looked everyone straight in the eye while she said whatever she wanted, no matter how cruel or mean. "I'm not afraid to tell anyone what I think." She told me that I was a liar because liars won't look people in the eye when they talk to them. I was very shy growing up and didn't look people in the eye, and especially not her. No one wants to be judged, and that woman would look at a person and size them up.
Them there Phds don't be a knowin' nothin'. My grandaddy done tole me otherwise.
Among most Native Americans, direct eye contact is considered rude and/or challenging. People who are unaware of this think that Native Americans are shifty-eyed and therefore untrustworthy.
Yes, Asians are usually taught not to look into another's eyes, and especially one in authority. I know someone who is of Chinese ancestry, and he was taught that. I have to keep in mind that he isn't looking at me because he was taught it was rude and it is a habit now. It is definitely different in different cultures.
I find that I can't make eye contact with someone and concentrate of what he is saying at the same time. This is probably because I have Aspergers disorder. In high school, a teacher once asked me to tell her what she had just said. She probably thought I wasn't paying attention because of that whole eye contact thing. I really surprised her when I repeated everything she had just said verbatim.
I wish someone would do a study on rolling your eyes and come up with a similar finding - that way I can tell my other half that, seriously, I AM listening and not merely dismissing what she's just said; then I could point to a study to prove it, so she'll actually believe me...
Have they tested the blind?
Interesting question. I actually like to close my eyes to picture things, but I realize that would really look odd...lol.
We had a housemate once who turned out to be a long time scam artist, with dozens of victims in several states. This piece of work (involved with churches, charities, political organizations, etc.) can make direct eye contact with people with no "shifting" at all, shake their hands, smile, ingratiate himself to them, win their trust, then take advantage of them. Clearly, "shifty eyes" mean nothing.
It's an old used car salesman's trick, look 'em in the eye as you sell 'em a lemon.
Isn't there one that if you touch your face, the higher you touch, the more you're lying? People will come up with all sorts of dumb ways to decide if someone is lying and sometimes get so fixated on these things that they become blind.
I do find that when I need to retrieve a memory from the jumble that is my brain, I tend to look down and to the left.
If that doesn't work, I will continue to speak with the person I am having a conversation with, but mentally "file" the question somewhere in my brain where I can easily access it again. Generally, the answer will show up within a minute or 2. The only shifting done is within the filing system in my brain.
I've always believed that people whose eyes are set close to their nose are untrustworthy.
To spot a liar, it's not the shifty eyes that give them away, it's the (R) after their name.
Oh come on. Really good liars look you straight in the eye without blinking. I've done it successfully for years.
I have trouble continuously looking people in the eye; it doesn't matter who it is, I still can't maintain prolonged eye contact. It doesn't matter if we are discussing something awkward or if I am in trouble, even if I'm having a relaxed conversation with my closest friend I still can't have more than 5-10 seconds of solid eye contact. Although I'm not sure if really prolonged eye contact would be any less weird, lol.
If I'm asked a question or even being instructed on something at work, I will look down and to the side. But that just means I am thinking, not that I am not listening.