The eyes

[Lychee]

I believe that if you look into a person's eyes you can get a good idea of their personality and character.

My question is, is there any technique or strategy you can use to get more accurate impressions of a person by looking into their eyes aside from experience or hindsight?

[JJH]

Take an acting class and you'll find, over many weeks, you'll develop the skill in detecting meaning behind the eyes. If you really do this, and go into it with the intention of this kind of development, I'll bet that your empathy with others will shoot up as well. You'll also be able to detect if someone is lying or telling the truth (and really helps your poker game (although I don't recommend playing with good actors...))

[Adam Sargant]

Originally Posted by Lychee

I believe that if you look into a person's eyes you can get a good idea of their personality and character.

My question is, is there any technique or strategy you can use to get more accurate impressions of a person by looking into their eyes aside from experience or hindsight?

There is, in NLP, the concept of eye accessing cues... it is my opinion that as taught it is so much baloney, but with calibration, some evidence seems to support it (at least in my experience... I would like to research it further).

Encyclopedia of NLP

For example, watch what happens when someone really has to work hard to access an internal representation (ask them something really tough)... very often their eyes go here, then there, then somewhere else... they really look for an answer. So, when lying on the fly for example, people might look to the right and to the left several times, look down (they would likely do this very quickly)... in NLP terms that would suggest that they are accessing internal representations of imaginary events (the lie), then checking them against remembered events (for plausability) and against their own internal dialogue for internal consistency.

But (and I cannot stress this enough, since it is rarely stressed in books or on trainings) the model is meaningless unless each individual is calibrated and constantly recalibrated as many factors may influence how accessing cues come into play. I would also suggest that bringing into conscious awareness a process that is probably already working effectively unconsciously actually makes the job harder... our unconscious usually does a pretty good job of reading an individual (when we get ourselves the hell out of the way)... it is our trust in the process (or lack of trust) that disrupts the process.

Love and light

Adam

[Victoria]

I would agree that it is our trust in the process that helps. I personally think eyes fascinating; they're what I'm drawn to in a person. But how much can you tell? I say I can usually tell what someone's feeling if I feel close to them (as if I understand them, and respect them, as in a friend/accquaintance, as well as a family member or loved one).

[AndyMartin]

I think both aspects exist.

Yes, there are identifiable patterns in eye movements that can be indicative of certain mental and emotional states.

But there is something intangible and deep in the wells of the eyes. Have you ever looked deeply into your own eyes in the mirror, let yourself comprehend their full depth and communication?