Is keeping eye contact really such a great success?

[ForeverYoung]

When you taught to keep eye contact even through the stutter, why?

So the other person can clearly see your struggles, your tics, you contortions? Are they supposed to be impressed?

Is it supposed to not look bad? I've never understood this. I try eye contact but the moment I get into a block I ABORTABORTABORT cause who wants to see someone struggle?

[grantM]

Keep eye contact helps you to keep that communicative connection with the listener. It also shows respect during a conversation. A lot of communication is also done via non-verbal communication such as gestures and expressions. It also helps your confidence by being able to look a person eye to eye and communicate. Takes a lot of practice though especially if you divert on a conscious level.

[peebee]

Like Grant said, eye contact is an essential part of communicating effectively. Sure sometimes it can be difficult, especially if you're stuttering and are embarrassed but if you avoid eye contact you're sending a message that you're either uninterested or lack effective communication skills.

Stuttering sucks but you gotta remember, proper verbal communication isn't just about fluency. By showing good etiquette and other non-verbal communication cues, your stutter will be less noticeable and you'll present yourself more professionally.

[Zachary]

Grant hit the nail on the head. I would also like to add; Trying using a piercing gaze while speaking, it causes a lot of people to roll over, figuratively speaking. Don't go overboard or psycho-killer with the gaze, it will come off as fake. But push it enough to make them uncomfortable. Remember to smile. This will add an interesting element to your stutter, and will change their preconception about the issue. It works for me.

As Grant also mentioned, watch for body language. When they begin to show signs of rolling over, like caving their chest, rotating their forearms/palms forward, or maybe dropping their chin and neck; Divert your gaze exactly to that area for just a moment, then start staring a hole straight through their face again. It shows them you are aware of their weakness. And yeah, wear a genuine smile while doing this.

It throws people seriously off their game, especially as a stutterer. I mean, you wouldn't do it to your close friends or mom. But you get the idea. Maybe I'm crazy and stuttering has gotten the best of me though :rolleyes:

[WhiteLatinoBoy]

i hardly ever make contact. even with my family and friends. i just automatically look away when i feel im gonna stutter. thats the obvious sign that i am awkward. i mean i just cant help it. i just see it as very uncomfortable just looking at the person and not saying anything and making weird faces trying to say a word. it helps me a little to just look away for a second to focus myself and try and get the word out. i mean i do may eye contact but not very long. ah its so stupid. haha

[ForeverYoung]

Yeah, I get all of this. And it makes perfect sense. But I've always looked at it differently. I've got this mindset that its not about what you do at all - its about the other person.

(and I'm honored to be the catalyst for a great post on Stuttering.me, I just feel bad he called my mindset a threat :( )


My main qualm about the whole situation is that its about the other person. You can walk into the room believing you're the goddamn President of the World. But its how other people react to you that mold reality and change things.

My distaste about all of this talk is that; it don't matter. I don't want moral victories. I've gotten enough, and put me on a few drugs and I can get them whenever I want. Human communication is pretty much one of the major parts of our existence, and speaking is SUCH a amazingly large part of it that we stutterers are down 0-2 before we even step into the box.

Keeping eye contact through a stutter may help us stack our building blocks, it may be what we are supposed to do. But you know, if at the end of the conversation, the other person is like "What the hell was that/OMG/*any negative reaction due to my stuttering*", I don't give a damn.

And whenever I hear things like "Well that person isn't worth knowing/*anything putting down the other person to patch up my feelings*" I just feel worse that that basically reinforces I'm living with a condition that will effect (as it already has tremendously) all the relationships I will have in life.

[pamm]

Eye contact is an important topic. I think its crucial to establishing effective communciation. However, I some times break eye contact myself when stuttering, even though I hate it when a listener does the very same thing.

And I have been having some issues with a secondary behavior lately, somteimes squeezing my left eye when trying to get a sound out, or when stuck in a stuttering moment.

So yeah, its important, but complex. One of those easier said than done!

[Keyo]

To be honest i was just going to start the same topic...

i have to admit am doing so bad with eye contact during talking/stuttering... and i dont even know what am i supposed to do to help me at least gain the confidence to look to the eye of the person while talking to him/her... i mean when i talk fluently i usually maintain eye contact but as soon as i hit a block during my speech i just turn my face down unconsioucly and its not that when i overcome a block i look back again, no i keep my eye contact away until i finish the conversation...
Any advices?

[Rkanjl]

It throws people seriously off their game, especially as a stutterer. I mean, you wouldn't do it to your close friends or mom. But you get the idea. :rolleyes:

Yes! My bf (stutterer) and I (non-stutterer) spoke about the eye contact thing very early on so it never threw me off guard or made me uncomfortable, but now sometimes I think that passers-by must think we're having a staring contest or something when we're really just having a normal conversation with one another :p

[Fieldsy84]

I notice when I make good eye contact I speak more fluent....but that first second I slip up I just forget about it and look away...

I just did the starting gaze thing just now and it honestly helped...maybe because it made me laugh inside but I didn't really stutter much :)

[travisleexo]

Grant hit the nail on the head. I would also like to add; Trying using a piercing gaze while speaking, it causes a lot of people to roll over, figuratively speaking. Don't go overboard or psycho-killer with the gaze, it will come off as fake. But push it enough to make them uncomfortable. Remember to smile. This will add an interesting element to your stutter, and will change their preconception about the issue. It works for me.

As Grant also mentioned, watch for body language. When they begin to show signs of rolling over, like caving their chest, rotating their forearms/palms forward, or maybe dropping their chin and neck; Divert your gaze exactly to that area for just a moment, then start staring a hole straight through their face again. It shows them you are aware of their weakness. And yeah, wear a genuine smile while doing this.


I'm not trying to be argumentative, but how does trying to intimidate the other person, or purposefully make them uncomfortable with aggressive body language, help you communicate with them? If you approach every social interaction like an attempted conquest, wherein you're trying to make the other person feel weak and inferior, thereby giving yourself a measure of superficial confidence, then you're missing the point of communication. Your technique is fine if you're simply trying to convey information, but I'm more worried about establishing real connections with people.

Even if you temporarily succeed in not stuttering by staring someone down Clockwork-Orange-style, you're still being misunderstood, and I think that's what frustrates many stutterers the most .... the botched human connections ... the fact that it's so difficult to convey our true selves, or express our emotions, to another person in spoken language. Really, any time you try to overcompensate for an insecurity by adopting some exaggerated pose it usually comes back to bite you in the ass one way or another.

(After typing all of this, I'll still probably give it a shot sometime. Haha. In a moment of stuttering, I would probably abandon every principle I have just to get through a block.)