The Secret Of The Pupils

Surely you have heard the saying “the eyes are the mirror of the soul”. When we want to know if someone is telling us the truth, we ask them to look us in the eye.

Is this a simple popular belief, or do the pupils really hold a lot of secrets?

” I feel that there is something in you, something between us, that makes me exist … When I look at your eyes I know that God has not stopped existing “

(En tus pupilas, Shakira)

In order to unravel this mystery, we will rely on several researches. Science has found that the pupils have the ability to send signals to others, including information that often does not coincide with what we say in words.

The interesting part of the question is knowing what those two black circles covered in the colors of the iris are telling us.

What can the pupils say?

Looking a person in the eye, we can discover many things. Here are some of them:

• If you are thinking about something complex. Research carried out by psychologists at the University of Chicago revealed that the more complicated a question is to resolve, the more dilated the pupils. This can have a logical explanation: when we have to solve a problem, we want to absorb all the information possible in order to find the solution.

• If his brain is saturated. This is a phenomenon that happens more and more often. In this case, the study was developed at the University of California; the scientists linked the size of the pupils to the time of crossing the limit of cognitive capacity. When we are saturated with work or information, it is more difficult to focus and have quality vision. The pupils significantly decrease their size when the mind needs rest.

• If she is interested. Also in California, a group of people were read an erotic book, a story about a mutilation and a passage with a “neutral” content, that is, devoid of particular emotions. Participants’ pupils dilated during the erotic and violent readings, and returned to normal during the third story. When people are interested in something, their pupils dilate.

• If you feel disgusted. Some psychologists from the University of Chicago have prepared slides with images showing various events; meanwhile, a video camera captured the participants’ eyes. When they looked at the photographs containing violence, injured children or dead animals, a very interesting thing happened: initially the pupils enlarged, but, a few seconds later, they shrunk, trying not to see this image anymore.

• If you feel pain. At the University of Washington, a group of volunteers agreed to receive light electric shocks at their fingertips to see what happened to their pupils. The result was unanimous. Whenever people felt pain, the pupils enlarged, a gesture representative of a sort of response of the nervous system to escape danger. It is interesting to point out that, at that moment, the visual acuity is equal to 100% because the body is preparing to flee.

• If it has a certain political orientation. The research carried out at the University of Louisiana is very curious. People with different political orientations and very sure of their convictions were brought together; later, they were shown photographs of people linked to the republican and democratic world (the two political parties in the USA). When the volunteers saw an image of a person sharing their political views, their pupils grew larger; the opposite happened when they observed people from the opposite party.

… And the iris?

The colored part of the eyes is called the iris and it too can provide us with important information about others, in this case about their personality.

If the “waves” go from the inside out (ie if they start from the pupil and go towards the edge of the iris), it means that we are dealing with a sensitive, honest, friendly and positive person. If the opposite happens, it is a nervous and impulsive personality.

Most of the changes that take place in the pupils of others are likely to go unnoticed, because to do that we would have to be very close to their face, which could affect their reactions and change them. However, it is interesting to know what pupil dilation means in the person in front of us.