Eye expression test by Simon Baron Cohen

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I took this test over a year ago and got a much lower score (can't remember the exact score). I scored a 32 this time.

I missed..
12: sceptical
15: contemplative
19: tentative
25: interested


Looking at these "cues", I only had an answer for one without looking at my choices. Concerned. I saw that and immediately thought of concerned parents on a movie or something.

I'd be much harder pressed without being able to just pick the right answer from a small group of wrong answers. I'm even harder pressed considering I don't make eye contact!

I scored an 11. Some of those (well, most) were hard!

I took this test a short while ago and got 21. Another time I took it, much earlier, I got a 22.

Just a thought about this test. It seems it would be more accurate if they showed you a picture for a few seconds then asked you to identify the emotion. I found on many of these, I had to spend alot of time thinking what it was, some even copying what the picture was doing to try to give me a better idea. Spending time on this that I don't have in real life, because too much time analyzing would be strage and because the looks people give change easily.

In my view, this is such a lame and limited test. Baron-Cohen should be ashamed.
All sorts of factors impact the final score - such as age, cognitive compensation for intuitive facial reading deficits etc...not to mention the fact that it is a purely "static test" involving one form of processing. Most of us autistics excel at static type things and many of us can read facial expressions IN ISOLATION from other sensory processing, such as the verbal, tactile, smell etc.

Many of us learn to do well at static intelligence tests. What we do not do well at is dynamic forms of intelligence that involve change and dynamism, the real world and in the moment multi channel processing.

I can read faces in isolation like this. I can do REALLY well at it. What I cannot do is process that information in tandem with the information coming in from a new geographical context, new sights, sounds and the verbal, smell etc.

Gee, some of these specialists really are way behind in terms of understanding how many of us operate.

The other issue that is very important is that this test should be timed.
And there should also be some kind of discussion as to HOW one arrives at their summations.

Whoa. OK. This is weird

I got 34 out of 36

I must make this point though:

Some of them were just pictures of make-up-covered women's eyes with no expression at all, and had choices available like "fantasising" and "desire" . I ticked those boxes because I thought, "Anyone who goes on about the Male Brain all the time and how logical it is, blah blah blah (like Baron-Cohen does) is probably stupid enough to mistake someone's being DESIRABLE or the OBJECT OF FANTASY for them actually having a desiring or fantasising expression; and also stupid enough to think that a pair of eyes with black stuff on them is a desirable object of fantasy ..."

Looks like I was right.

Oh, I also did the facial expressions test and got a great deal LOWER score than most confirmed Aspies on the forum. The difference between the very low score I got with the faces and the extremely high (even for an NT) one I got with the eyes is pretty weird ...

...parts of things, anyone?

Last edited by anomie on 24 Feb 2010, 10:08 am, edited 1 time in total.

Your score: 29

I did pretty well when it comes to just the eyes, not moving, no mouth to worry about and whatnot. I do terrible at the full on face ones trying to guess emotions.

Good catch!! !! This test gets posted at regular intervals (or this old thread gets bumped at regular intervals) soI've taken and re-taken this test too many times for my score to mean anything. Some things about it have always bugged me. The first is that the photographs are just...photographs. They are static, not mobile as an actual expression would be. This made it far harder for me to interpret correctly because part of interpreting an expression is factoring in how it moves. The way that peoples' eyes move is what broadcasts their feelings, not a static pose.

The other thing that bugged me was that these were pictures of actors and models. They are not broadcasting their feelings. They are broadcasting what the director or photographer tells them to. Something I learned long ago when studying Feminist Interpretations of Media (actual college class!!) is that it is common for men to mistake a woman being desirable with her desiring them. This masculine misconception is exploited in adverstising. It looks like a couple of those "desire" expressions were lifted from ads. My first time taking this test I got those "wrong" because when I looked at those womens' eyes I didn't see desire emanating from them. I saw pretty women posing for an ad. But Baron Cohen looked at those pics and mis-read "I want her" for "she wants me". BWAHAHA.

Sorry if this has been mentioned already, but the time you take to do the test is very significant. People only have the same facial expression for very short amounts of time before it changes, so if you take a long time you can't read eye expressions that well in real life. I scored 26/36 when given this by a psychologist, but this took me 24 minutes. NTs do this test extremely quickly (I found it online and got my family to do it - the bit that took longest for them was reading and clicking on the right answer, not looking at the eyes!).
The psychologist was amused that I said the 'flirtatious' one was 'hostile'.

You know what is so absolutely RIDICULOUS here - Baron-Cohen is supposed to be an EXPERT on how other people think and feel, and yet WE - who are supposedly BAD at it - have CAUGHT HIM OUT!

We got it right - we knew that the women were just posing and did not feel desire. He thought they did and he made that the "correct" answer but he was wrong!

This is giving me an intense dose of a terrible feeling I get sometimes - where I realise how illogical the world is and what nonsense people think. I suppose it makes me feel superior, but that pales into insignificance compared to the FEAR. When someone like Baron-Cohen gets something like that wrong ... what hope is there?

By the way I apologise for repeating myself in the new thread I started about this. I know it is bad forum behaviour but I needed to do it. I was really shocked to get such a high score and I wanted to ask people about it and I thought that if it was buried in an old thread no-one would read it.

I still find it laughable that people think that one can see emotion in the expression of someone.
To me, it is an utter lie.

When you put it like that it does seem silly. What if someone's face is wrinkled in a "frown" shape? Does it mean they are always angry? What if someone is born with narrow eyes, are they always suspicious? I try not to assume anything about what somebody feels unless they make it very clear. Most NTs do not make themselves clear and that is why I hang around with people on the spectrum mostly as they will talk about their feelings either clearly or not at all.

I cannot agree with you more. Well put.

I did very well on this test. I missed two. However, I sat there and analyzed bits and pieces of the person's face (under and around the eyes) and compared it to the choices that were given on the test. It was all about elimination. I didn't even look at the whole face.....only parts to get a "read". I'm pretty much incapable of seeing the whole thing. It's hard for me to explain.

Do you have evidence for this?
Again, evidence?

Am I the only one who has low note? My score is 16