How To Make Persuasive Eye Contact

Posted on June 5, 2014

Photo: Flickr

Too much eye contact can make other people more resistant to persuasion, a recent study finds.

The results fly in the face of the common advice to make strong eye contact with another person when you want to persuade them.

People in the study were even less persuaded by eye contact when they held particularly strong opposing views.

In the study, participants watched a variety of videos on issues like nuclear energy, assisted suicide and university tuition, which had been culled from the internet.

Afterwards, their attitudes towards the issue were measured and compared to their attitudes beforehand.

The findings show that direct eye contact makes skeptical listeners less likely to change their minds, not more, as previously believed.

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Source material from PsyBlog