Staring how we look sobre la mirada.pdf - artecolonial

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A Physical Response
. . . the human mind always burns to hear and take in novelties.
—Gervase of Tillbury, Otia imperialia, circa 1210
Staring is a universal part of our cognitive architecture that natural selection
has bequeathed us. The evolutionary origin of staring is a startle response.
When staring is intentional—as in the long loving look or the hostile glare—
we are masters of our eyes. When an unexpected sight grabs our attention,
however, staring is spontaneous and volatile. As the epigraph to the previous
section says, “staring, in its pure and simple essence, is the time required by
the brain to make sense of the unexpected.” 1 We cannot, even when we try,
ignore compelling visual stimuli; we can only withdraw the stare once it is in
play (Yantis 1998, 239). Intense, persistent looking and the ability to interpret
such stares are fundamental to our survival as social beings as well. Human
infants and mothers stare long and emphatically at each other to cement their
relationship (Baron-Cohen 1985, 39). We enact social hierarchies through
visual dominance displays (Ellyson and Dovido 1995). Even very young infants
show surprise by staring for longer periods at scenes that violate the
laws of physics or seem physically implausible than they look at a predictable
or expected event. 2 Staring not only signals alertness in the starer, it alerts the
staree. Another’s stare actually excites electrical activity in the brain (Baron-
Cohen 1995, 98). The staring encounter arouses us as well. Our heart rate
increases when we are stared at; being subjected to a stare even registers on
a cortical EEG. So viscerally potent is the staring encounter that we can even
feel stares directed at us. In fact, humans from infancy can detect unseen
stares. We not only believe that we can tell when we are being stared at, but
repeated experiments dating as early as the late nineteenth century suggest
that in fact we do (Colwell et al. 2000). Staring, then, has vivid physiological
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