Body Language of Eye Blinking (Less)

Body Language of Eye Blinking (Less)

No picCue: Eye Blinking (Less)

Synonym(s): N/A

Description: When the eyes blink less than normal.

In One Sentence: When eyes blink less often than normal, it signals boredom, hostility (staring), or indifference.”

How To Use it: When trying to relax, allow the focus of the eyes to relax.

Conversely, when trying to intimidate another person, persistent, non-blinking eye contact can signal aggression. Use less blinking to show that another person has become an object to you. To be turned into an object is the ultimate insult. Use “staring contests” to test your ability to dominate other people. You may find that more submissive people tend to hold less unblinking eye contact or, in other words, are the first to look away or blink.

In a dating context, less eye contact is called “gazing.” It is a much softer, more relaxed version of eye contact. This should be used to create bonding and intimacy.

Context: General.

Verbal Translation: “I’m bored, falling asleep, feeling hostile, or indifferent to you so my eyes lack any character of engagement.”

Variant: See Eye Blinking (Rapid), Staring or The Evil Eye.

Cue In Action: His wife began retelling an office gossip story for the third time, his eyes glazed over and he took on a zombie state.

Meaning and/or Motivation: When eyes blink less rapidly or seem to not blink at all, it is due to a zoning out (boredom) or due to anger or hostility, as in staring. Reduced eye blinking can also signify indifference and in some circumstances even confidence. We see this in stare-down competitions where the last person to blink is the victor in the dominance competition.

It has been shown that people with confidence tend to establish more eye contact and hold it longer than normal. Eyes that blink less can also show interest and intensity, but also piercing and assault. When the eyes blink less the eye can blur due to dryness so eyes that blink less are eyes that aren’t interested in seeing due to a lack of emotion.

Cue Cluster: When eyes depict boredom they tend to defocus as well as blink less frequently. The eyes will seem to look through people and there will be no agreement indicators such as head nods and “mhmms” and “yeses.” When eyes blink less due to anger, they will be piercing and follow a target intensely with the eyelids squinting rather than relax with open facial expressions. When eye contact is due to confidence we expect the head to nod, that conversation will be flowing, and that the head will be tilted to the side.

Body Language Category: Attentive, Boredom, Confident body language, Disengagement, Eye Language, Indicators of disinterest (IOD), Indicator of interest (IoI), Threat displays.

Resources:

Barbato, Giuseppe ; De Padova, Vittoria ; Paolillo, Antonella Raffaella ; Arpaia, Laura ; Russo, Eleonora ; Ficca, Gianluca. Increased spontaneous eye blink rate following prolonged wakefulness. Physiology & Behavior. 2007. 90(1): 151-154.

Brefczynski-Lewis, Julie A ; Berrebi, Michael E ; Mcneely, Marie E ; Prostko, Amy L ; Puce, Aina. In the Blink of an Eye: Neural Responses Elicited to Viewing the Eye Blinks of Another Individual. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience. 2011 5.

Condon, William, and W. Ogston (1967). “A Segmentation of Behavior.” In Journal of Psychiatric Research (Vol. 5), pp. 221-35.

Dawson, Michael E. ; Hazlett, Erin A. ; Filion, Diane L. ; Nuechterlein, Keith H. ; Schell, Anne M. Mineka, Susan (editor). Attention and Schizophrenia: Impaired Modulation of the Startle Reflex. Journal of Abnormal Psychology. 1993. 102(4): 633-641.

Drew, G. C. (1951). Variations in reflex blink-rate during visual motor tasks. Quaterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 3, 73–88.

Goldstein, R., Bauer, L. O., & Stern, J. A. (1992). Effect of task difficulty and interstimulus interval on blink parameters. International Journal of Psychophysiology, 13, 111–118.

Gregersen, Tammy S. Nonverbal Cues: Clues to the Detection of Foreign Language Anxiety. Foreign Language Annals. 2005. 38(3): 388-400
http://bodylanguageproject.com/articles/what-anxious-learners-can-tell-us-about-anxious-body-language-how-to-read-nonverbal-behavior/

Holland, M. K., & Tarlow, G. (1972). Blinking and mental load. Psychological Reports, 31, 119–127.

Holland, M. K., & Tarlow, G. (1975). Blinking and thinking. Psychological Reports, 41, 403–406. READ

Huang, Zhinjin ; Stanford, Matthew S. ; Barratt, Ernest S.. Blink rate related to impulsiveness and task demands during performance of event-related potential tasks.
Personality and Individual Differences. 1994. 16(4): 645-648.

Karson, Craig N. ; Berman, Karen Faith ; Donnelly, Edward F. ; Mendelson, Wallace B. ; Kleinman, Joel E. ; Wyatt, Richard Jed. Speaking, thinking, and blinking Psychiatry Research. 1981. 5(3): 243-246.

Kanfer, F. (1960). “Verbal Rate, Eyeblink, and Content in Structured Psychiatric Interviews.” In Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology (Vol. 61, No. 3), pp. 341-47.

Leal, Sharon ; Vrij, Aldert. Blinking During and After Lying. Journal of Nonverbal Behavior. 2008. 32(4): 187-194.

Mann, Samantha ; Ewens, Sarah ; Shaw, Dominic ; Vrij, Aldert ; Leal, Sharon ; Hillman, Jackie. Lying Eyes: Why Liars Seek Deliberate Eye Contact. Psychiatry, Psychology and Law. 2013. 20(3): 452-461.

Mann, Samantha ; Ewens, Sarah ; Shaw, Dominic ; Vrij, Aldert ; Leal, Sharon ; Hillman, Jackie. Eye contact while lying during an interview. Bulletin of the Psychonomic Society. 1976. 7(1): 87-89.

Mann, Samantha ; Ewens, Sarah ; Shaw, Dominic ; Vrij, Aldert ; Leal, Sharon ; Hillman, Jackie. Children’s Knowledge of Deceptive Gaze Cues and Its Relation to Their Actual Lying Behavior. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology. 2009. 103(2): 117-134.

Mann, Samantha ; Ewens, Sarah ; Shaw, Dominic ; Vrij, Aldert ; Leal, Sharon ; Hillman, Jackie. The Lying Chicken and the Gaze Avoidant Egg: Eye Contact, Deception, and Causal Order. Southern Communication Journal. 2006. 71(4): 401-411.

Mann, Samantha ; Ewens, Sarah ; Shaw, Dominic ; Vrij, Aldert ; Leal, Sharon ; Hillman, Jackie. Tell-tale eyes: children’s attribution of gaze aversion as a lying cue.(Author abstract). Developmental Psychology. 2008. 44(6): 1655(13).

Mann, Samantha ; Ewens, Sarah ; Shaw, Dominic ; Vrij, Aldert ; Leal, Sharon ; Hillman, Jackie. ‘Look into my eyes’: can an instruction to maintain eye contact facilitate lie detection? Psychology Crime & Law. 2010. 16(4): 327-348.

Mann, Samantha ; Ewens, Sarah ; Shaw, Dominic ; Vrij, Aldert ; Leal, Sharon ; Hillman, Jackie. Legal Interviewers Use Children’s Affect and Eye Contact Cues to Assess Credibility of Their Testimony. Early Child Development and Care. 2010. 180(3): 397-404.

Navarro, Joe. 2008. What Every BODY is Saying: An Ex-FBI Agent’s Guide to Speed-Reading People. William Morrow Paperbacks.

Porter, Stephen ; Brinke, Leanne. The truth about lies: What works in detecting high‐stakes deception? Legal and Criminological Psychology. 2010. 15(1): 57-75.

Siegle, Greg J ; Ichikawa, Naho ; Steinhauer, Stuart. Blink before and after you think: blinks occur prior to and following cognitive load indexed by pupillary responses.
Psychophysiology. 2008. 45(5): 679-87.

Sugiyama, Toshiko ; Watanabe, Ikue ; Tada, Hideoki. Effects of position and task demands on endogenous eyeblink.(Learning & Memory). Perceptual and Motor Skills. 2013. 116(2): 406(9).

Tada, H ; Yamada, F ; Hariu, T. Changes of eye-blink activities during hypnotic state. Perceptual and motor skills. 1990. 71(3 Pt 1): 832-4.

Tada, H ; Yamada, F ; Hariu, T. Analysis of blink rate patterns in normal subjects. Movement Disorders. 1997. 12(6): 1028-1034.