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The Communicative Eyes

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Gazes, Words, and Silences in Pragmatics

Part of the book series: Perspectives in Pragmatics, Philosophy & Psychology ((PEPRPHPS,volume 36))

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Abstract

With our eyes we usually transmit two types of information: information concerning our mental states (emotions, intentions, etc ...) and information on our attentional focus. The eyes of human beings, compared to those of other animals, appear more expressive due to some characteristics that are specific of humans, effectively described in 2001 by Kobayashi and Kohshima. The two authors, after comparing the morphological conformation of the eye of almost half of the known species of primates, found some unique characteristics compared to the rest of the animal world: (1) humans have a white sclera, this makes clearly visible the difference between the iris (which obviously includes the pupil) and sclera; (2) the sclera is exceptionally large in humans in proportion to the overall size of the eye and finally (3) the human sclera is exceptionally developed horizontally.

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  1. Dipartimento di Patologia Umana dell’Età Adulta e dell’Età Evolutiva, Università degli Studi di Messina, Messina, Italy

    Paola Pennisi

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Pennisi, P. (2023). The Communicative Eyes. In: Gazes, Words, and Silences in Pragmatics. Perspectives in Pragmatics, Philosophy & Psychology, vol 36. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-42571-4_2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-42571-4_2

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