Tips about eye contact:
In normal conversations, whether short or long, it is common for people to look away from each other's eyes naturally during the course of the conversation. These "look away" moments can happen when someone coughs, blows their nose, something occurs outside of the environment of the conversation, or when both people laugh at a joke.
When re-connecting eye contact during the interaction, remember that it is also common to not look back and forth between someone's right & left eyes, but instead to focus on one of their eyes. If you are successful, the person will do the same thing, which you'll notice when one of their eyes is directly looking into one of your eyes. This is a much more comfortable way of maintaining eye contact because you only have to focus on one of their eyes. Some therapists recommend looking at the bridge of someone's nose, but I don't like prescribing this behavioral treatment aside from an initial behavioral exposure to the homework, because it can result in problems down the line where the person may come out and ask you, "is there something on my nose!?"
Last thing-- it is always a good idea to have a small smile on your face and do the "head nod" when making eye contact with strangers on the street. If they respond back, feel free to say, "Hi!". They may interpret this as an invitation to engage in conversation, which would then give you some practice with small talk, while still walking- "heck of a cold day today, eh?".
In normal conversations, whether short or long, it is common for people to look away from each other's eyes naturally during the course of the conversation. These "look away" moments can happen when someone coughs, blows their nose, something occurs outside of the environment of the conversation, or when both people laugh at a joke.
When re-connecting eye contact during the interaction, remember that it is also common to not look back and forth between someone's right & left eyes, but instead to focus on one of their eyes. If you are successful, the person will do the same thing, which you'll notice when one of their eyes is directly looking into one of your eyes. This is a much more comfortable way of maintaining eye contact because you only have to focus on one of their eyes. Some therapists recommend looking at the bridge of someone's nose, but I don't like prescribing this behavioral treatment aside from an initial behavioral exposure to the homework, because it can result in problems down the line where the person may come out and ask you, "is there something on my nose!?"
Last thing-- it is always a good idea to have a small smile on your face and do the "head nod" when making eye contact with strangers on the street. If they respond back, feel free to say, "Hi!". They may interpret this as an invitation to engage in conversation, which would then give you some practice with small talk, while still walking- "heck of a cold day today, eh?".
