On the subject of accuracy vs politeness

[vergil96]

I think different self-aware creatures, such as anthropoids, will adapt to different ways to do similar things. Even among humans some cultures use high levels of eye contact, others much less so, and will be using other body language cues to express the same sorts of information from one to another (including emotional and non-verbal information).

To exclude DNA in looking at commonalities and differences is difficult, because it's the DNA that provides the ability to perform these complex interactions. It seems the better anthropologists and biologists get at studying simian social structures and behaviours, they uncover more aspects that relate very closely to ourselves, even though carried out differently (using the body language etc that works for that particular species.

I'd be inclined to suspect this is pretty mutable too, and has a lot of environmental factors. In some environments having high level eye contact is likely an advantage over other methods, and our brains are trained through environmental state. Someone from another low-eye contact culture has the same brain as their opposite number, but have simply developed in an environment that present a particular way of communicating as most advantageous in that environment.

Tbh talking on this forum I get the impression that American culture puts a lot of weight on eye contact. I have never experienced a similar narrative about it. All I heard was more like don't look on the shoes, it makes you look shy or something similar. Firstly, no very negative connotations of poor eye contact, more that it makes you seem shy, secondly, nobody seems to bat an eye if it's not direct eye contact, but somewhere on the face or if you look in the direction of the person you're talking to. The whole narrative seems like an American cultural norm to me along with having to smile all the time, from an European perspective, Americans smile much more than Europeans do and also speak louder. Making very strong eye contact seems to fit the general norm of projecting a strong presence, as opposed to more toned down European norms. I can't speak about all Asian countries, but I'm interested in Japanese culture and they're even more toned down, more gentle in their behaviour. Apparently they avoid eye contact altogether. To wrap it up: it strikes me as a cultural norm how much eye contact is made. Even on this forum, I've never heard that sort of narratives around it before joining here.

 

[Boogs]

As for the conspiracy-biased individuals: what to do?

This one is a bit of a stinker. It seems that no amount of rationalising in the moment (e.g. in a single conversation) will sway the majority of conspiracy theorists. There are of course the shepherds and sheep in the group, with some simply acting as cult leaders for their own enrichment and whom feed the cult with it's 'strictures' and 'chants' and other cult entrapments - these people will obviously not be swayed while they profit from being a prophet.

The sheep will join the group and feed off it not because of the subject matter of their conspiracy theory, but for group inclusion. To feel special and more in control by knowing something special that most others can't see. Other things like emergent group behaviour, inclusion, self promotion, extremism (how many cults don't end up extreme?), hierarchical positioning, and so on will tend to amplify the nonsense. Other reasons for being a member too, but I think the above is very common.

For someone like that to accept they are completely deluded is to lose everything they used it for to make themselves feel special, to sustain themselves, to not feel overwhelmed by a complex world beyond much understanding. Human's are rarely rational, hence our need for methodologies to be able to achieve complex projects that can't work on personal opinion, bias and prejudice. So trying a rational argument is rarely effective, maybe even counter productive.

I reckon it requires a social change to overcome it. The more the mainstream media debunk conspiracies the more people will gradually drift away from them, but since many mainstream media feed from our propensity for ever more extreme content, and conspiracy stories provide the perfect topic, this seems unlikely.

 

[Mary Terry]

Tbh talking on this forum I get the impression that American culture puts a lot of weight on eye contact. I have never experienced a similar narrative about it. All I heard was more like don't look on the shoes, it makes you look shy or something similar. Firstly, no very negative connotations of poor eye contact, more that it makes you seem shy, secondly, nobody seems to bat an eye if it's not direct eye contact, but somewhere on the face or if you look in the direction of the person you're talking to. The whole narrative seems like an American cultural norm to me along with having to smile all the time, from an European perspective, Americans smile much more than Europeans do and also speak louder. Making very strong eye contact seems to fit the general norm of projecting a strong presence, as opposed to more toned down European norms. I can't speak about all Asian countries, but I'm interested in Japanese culture and they're even more toned down, more gentle in their behaviour. Apparently they avoid eye contact altogether. To wrap it up: it strikes me as a cultural norm how much eye contact is made. Even on this forum, I've never heard that sort of narratives around it before joining here.

I think the importance of direct eye contact is exaggerated. As long as you occasionally glance at someone's eyes and kind of look at their faces in general, then Americans don't care. It's not really that important. But if you stare up at the sky or down at the floor while talking to someone, then it becomes "odd". It is also odd if someone stares directly at your eyes, rarely blinks, and never move their eyes off direct contact with your eyes. There's a subtlety to it, not really hard and fast rules.

 

[WhitewaterWoman]

The eye contact bit is heavily emphasized in the American public school system in “training” autistic students. At least in my state.

 

[Neia]

Tbh talking on this forum I get the impression that American culture puts a lot of weight on eye contact. I have never experienced a similar narrative about it. All I heard was more like don't look on the shoes, it makes you look shy or something similar. Firstly, no very negative connotations of poor eye contact, more that it makes you seem shy, secondly, nobody seems to bat an eye if it's not direct eye contact, but somewhere on the face or if you look in the direction of the person you're talking to. The whole narrative seems like an American cultural norm to me along with having to smile all the time, from an European perspective, Americans smile much more than Europeans do and also speak louder. Making very strong eye contact seems to fit the general norm of projecting a strong presence, as opposed to more toned down European norms. I can't speak about all Asian countries, but I'm interested in Japanese culture and they're even more toned down, more gentle in their behaviour. Apparently they avoid eye contact altogether. To wrap it up: it strikes me as a cultural norm how much eye contact is made. Even on this forum, I've never heard that sort of narratives around it before joining here.

Not sure if I ever mentioned this here, but the first time I ever realised that there was something wrong with how I looked at other people (not making eye contact) was when I was 13 or thereabouts and my mother told me that only cynical (deceitful) people look at others "from bellow" - chin down almost touching your chest, and gaze loosely askance.

After that, and because I didn't want to be perceived as cynical, I started trying to look at others "in the proper manner."

I'm Portuguese

 

[Judge]

I'm just wondering if emphasis on eye contact whether cultural or not is something that is waning in the present, as opposed to the past?

I'm not sure, but I'd like to think so.

When my parents sternly warned me against not looking people in the eye, it was at a time where most people had not even heard of the term "autism".

 

[Boogs]

In some cultures there seems to be a suggestion that a guilty person will not be able to look someone in the eye, and for people to not automatically be assumed to be guilty of some unnamed and unknown act, they must always look others straight in the eye without hesitation and with determination.

Absolute codswallop of course, and usually the most mendacious of people will lie merrily to someone while looking them in the eye with complete and total sincerity. But look to the media and the descriptions of 'wrong un's' are often that they are shifty looking, and can't face an accuser, and can be seen as the guilty party just by their looks. Logically we know this is nonsense, and yet the meme pervades.

This is so compelling to most people they absorb this as culture and pass it on to their offspring. It teaches people to be deferential to those who are said to be their betters, which suits those people down to the ground.

 

[Judge]

This is so compelling to most people they absorb this as culture and pass it on to their offspring. It teaches people to be deferential to those who are said to be their betters, which suits those people down to the ground.

Time doesn't necessarily heal everything....<sigh>

 

[Boogs]

Time doesn't necessarily heal everything....<sigh>

Oh, I tend to think it's a natural part of us, without which we wouldn't have formed the societies we have, wouldn't have been able to organise on such large and complex joint projects that have made us such powerful tool users. Te people most prone to that kind of thinking and behaviour are the muscle of society. Like most bodies muscles are one of the largest parts of it, without muscle cells (workers) who can cooperate intuitively the body is highly inefficient, and these subconscious behaviours (e.g. deferring to authority figures) are a mechanism that helps enable this coordination. How it subjectively feels has little bearing on it's evolved function.