Unit 67
Your Gaze Makes You Irresistible
When a woman walks into a crowded room, what her eyes do in the first moments may determine how attractive she is to any man meeting her gaze. If she turns her eyes deliberately toward a particular man, he immediately rates her as more likeable and physically attractive new research shows. If she glances at him but then turns her eyes away, that same man will rate her as much as less sexy. Our impressions of others are influenced by these simple, nonverbal clues -- and we are not objective in our judgment. That could mean that a man rates a woman as less attractive when she averts her gaze because he's feeling rejected.
The psychologists believe that the No.1 thing you can do to establish a relationship is simply looking at the other person, especially when listening to him. In fact, there's evidence that when someone looks at us, it's physiologically arousing, and there are these brain regions that get more engaged. Gaze can simply make you focus more on the person and what he might be saying or doing. And in situations where romance is a possibility, it makes the mind race and the heart beat a bit faster.
In a recent study, researchers had 43 college undergraduates (24 women, 19 men) sit before a computer screen and view a series of faces of fashion models. The images were computer-enhanced, so that they appeared to slowly turn their gaze toward, or away from, the viewer. In the first experiment, the researcher asked the participants to rate the physical attractiveness of the models on their screen as they turned toward or away from them. Male participants rated models who averted their gaze as less beautiful, while models who turned their eyes toward them got much higher marks. But for femal participants, ratings of attractiveness for the models were not affected by direction of gaze.
It is interesting to know why people are judged more harshly when their eyes communicate disinterest. You could say "Oh, she doesn't like me because I'm not good-looking, I'm too short." This type of reaction is called an internal attribution, with the viewer suspecting that the averted gaze reflects badly on the viewer. Or he could make a external attribution, which blames the other person, instead. In this "sour grapes" mood, them man interprets the woman's averted gaze as meaning "she is not a person I'd want to get to know, because she's hostile."
What is sure is that gaze matters. The most charming individuals use eye contact to their advantage. They set their gaze on you, averting it only occasionally and at proper intervals, because holding a gaze too long can also signal hostility. The result? They make you feel like you're the most important thing to them at that particular moment. |