UPDATED FOR 2021. Sociopaths are hiding in all segments of society. They can be male, female, all races, all religions, all ethnic groups, old, young, rich, poor, good-looking, homely. Only one aspect of their appearance may hint at their personality disorder:
The eyes of a sociopath.
If you’ve had any type of involvement with a sociopath, you may have noticed some weirdness about the person’s eyes. You may see this in one or more ways, such as:
Intense eye contact
In my book, Red Flags of Love Fraud one of the 10 warning signs is intense eye contact. To gather information for the book, I conducted the Lovefraud Romantic Partners Survey. Of the 1,352 survey respondents, 59% of them reported that their sociopathic partner engaged in intense eye contact.
Here’s how one woman described the moment she met the sociopath:
It was the most intense eye contact that I have ever experienced. So much so that it was all I could describe years later when I recalled “how we met.” — His eyes burned into my soul even though they were brown, and I didn’t like brown eyes!
Read more: Everyday sociopaths — master manipulators who live all around us
The stare
Many Lovefraud readers also mention the eyes of a sociopath and how the sociopaths stared at them. Here’s a recent email from a man about his ex-wife:
It has been my experience with a sociopath ex-wife that there are different reasons behind the stare. I saw the angry predator stare but I also saw other stares.
Before I started dating my wife I would catch her staring at me in church and I would think that this woman is interested in me, let’s go talk to her. She had two sons by two different men; one was eight and the other was four.
The first three weeks were great, then for some unknown reason she started expressing her anger at me. At first it was over small things but eventually grew into full time hatred. I would catch her staring at me at different times and wonder what she was doing. Turns out she was studying me very closely.
I learned in church that everything was either good or evil, moral or immoral. But studying psychology, I found a third category: amoral or non-moral. Money is amoral; it is neither good nor evil, but how people use it shows their heart is good or evil. Emotions are also amoral they are neither good nor evil, but how you choose to react to them makes you good or evil.
My father when angry would raise his voice and yell, so I followed his example as an adult and as a father. I saw, however, that not everyone yelled when angry. Some got very quiet, some would leave and come back later when calmed down.
My ex-wife would provoke me to anger with insults or other unkind words. I chose one day to pick a different reaction when angry. I would blow it off or be quiet. My ex-wife picked up on this right away and said in frustration that I was unpredictable when angry: You used to yell, now you just blow it off. I was floored at how quick she pick up on this change in my behavior and how it frustrated her attempts to provoke me to anger. I thought either she has an IQ in the four-digit range, or she has experience in this area before.
The stare was her studying my emotions and my chosen reactions to my emotions. She could read me like a book, and manipulated me to get her desired reaction out of me. I was amazed. I saw that she did this with everyone and could very easy manipulate others to her will.
Lifeless eyes
This is what I sometimes saw with my ex-husband. When he wasn’t actively engaged in manipulating me or someone else, his eyes seemed to indicate that there was nobody home inside.
In two Lovefraud surveys, I asked respondents if they agreed with this statement about their disordered romantic partners: “Sometimes, the individual’s eyes seemed to be lifeless.” In the Romantic Partner Survey, 60% of respondents agreed. In the Female Sociopath Survey, 57% of respondents agreed.
Because sociopaths can be so charming, exciting and magnetic, it can be difficult to spot this characteristic of lifeless eyes. Sometimes the best place to see it is in a photograph.
Black eyes
I’ve had several people tell me that when the sociopath was in a rage, his eyes turned totally black. I’ve only heard this about male sociopaths so far — if anyone has seen this in a female, please let me know.
Here’s a letter from a woman who was married to a male sociopath.
One occurrence to this day puts chills up my spine and tears in my eyes.
The night my husband held me at gunpoint with a loaded hunting rifle, something terrifying happened. My husband’s eyes are bright, light blue. He has beautiful eyes, so bright you notice them from across a room.
But that night, when he attacked me, his eyes were black. Not just black, but so black it goes beyond words. If you’ve ever watched the movie Amityville Horror, there’s a scene when the father has become deeply possessed and he turns on his family.
MY SPOUSE LOOKED 100% IDENTICAL TO THAT MAN!
AFTER THE INCIDENT I BEGAN TO QUESTION MY SANITY. BLUE EYES DON’T TURN BLACK. EYES CHANGE COLOR, BUT NO HUMAN HAS EYES LIKE THAT.
I researched it, and lo and behold there have been numerous cases dealing with narcissists and/or sociopaths where blue eyes were noted to have turned black when they were enraged!
How horrifying is that? It’s as though there is another being inside these people!
I still have nightmares. Never before nor since has he ever demonstrated that behavior. He says he doesn’t remember any of it. (No, I don’t think drugs and I know no alcohol was involved.)
Please warn your readers.
There’s a physiological reason for eyes turning black. Anger activates the sympathetic nervous system. This is the part of the autonomic nervous system from the primitive, cave man part of the brain that creates the “fight or flight” response. It triggers rapid breathing, increased heart rate and blood pressure, more adrenaline in the bloodstream and dilation of the pupils, which are the black parts of the eye.
The dilated pupils make the eyes seem black. They indicate that the person’s brain perceives a threat and is preparing to respond with aggression. You don’t want to be the object of possible aggression.
Pay attention to the eyes of a sociopath
If you experience intense eye contact, or see the predatory stare, lifeless eyes, or frightening black eyes, know that these are the only possible physical signs that you are involved with a sociopath.
You may only see the scary eyes of a sociopath for only a moment, before he or she regains control and starts love bombing or manipulating you. Do not doubt your perception. Do not tell yourself that you are imagining things.
It’s said that the eyes are the windows of the soul. If you see eyes that make you doubt there is a soul inside, pay attention. You may have just seen the truth.
Lovefraud originally published this article on Oct. 27, 2014.
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Hi Everyone, I still don’t comment on here much but read the stories every time. Don’t know how I missed this one because this subject has intrigued me especially since my Faux 7 month marriage to a very polished Spath. He had intense blue eyes, however the most noticeable thing about them was they would flash, sometimes I could not help but just stare at him, it was so strange. Not till later did I realize that when he lied the most is when the eyes flashed the most. Truly weird. I have not seen comments referring to flashing eyes on this site. If anyone has experienced this, please comment.
Also I have known and still know several of these types that have flat eyes, totally lifeless, like a shark! Very disturbing.
After writing this I have to shiver, these people are truly evil and it leaves me feeling as if I have escaped the Devil himself.
Hi Scrappy1, I think he was putting you under a trance or hypnotizing you.
This is one of the things sociopaths do! YES!! SO scary!!
I felt at the end of my marriage that my husband (now ex) was literally brain washing me. And i remember one night just before I left him that I refused to look in his eyes. He became irate at me and demanded that I look at him. I never did after that as it was my gut & his red flags that I was finally tuned into.
When I did escape I found a counselor who told me within 20 minutes of my first visit that I was married to a sociopath. I asked her if he was “brain washing me” she said YES!!! That is exactly what they do!
My counselor gave me the book “Woman who love psychopaths” by Sandra Brown. In the book she talks a little about how sociopaths “trance” and “hypnotic” their victims.
It’s so crazy what they do to our mindset but on top of it they are doing these two crazy things. If the world only knew!
I found some things on the net by googling “sociopath trance” (then with hypnosis) but at the time I was to scared to watch videos in fear that maybe the video owner was using these methods on people. I think Donna here at Lovefraud has posted some post on this subject so do a search up at the top on trance & hypnosis.
I too and many others feel that they escaped the “devil himself” and personally I think we all did. I dont think you have to die to go to “heaven” or “hell”, I think heaven & hell is right here on Planet Earth. If you want to live in “heaven” on Planet Earth you have to be very very very careful who you let into your inner circle. And if you encounter a sociopath at work or at a friends party = get them out of your life immediately because they want to suck you into hell on Earth.
Glad your gut was screaming that his eyes were not normal. I think this is one thing that we must be aware of when around strangers in every day life.
Hope this helps you out.
Take care.
This blog lead me to such important enlightenment about these kind of people (Narcissists, Sociopaths, Psychopaths etc) and I shall refer to as NSP(s).
I have recently ended a relationship (aka a war) with a female NSP, who displayed every single one of the traits in your list “Is your partner a Sociopath?” .. She was frightening in the end when realising that her acting charade had been discovered, the mask had slipped and the full extent of her evil ways had been found out.
Anyway, the reason why I am writing this is because she has the most demonic black eyes you always see in horror movies. I had (I’ve deleted them all now) about 20 photos where her eyes are completely black (no white at all). When I picked up on this and asked her about, after she would always either 1) refuse to have her photo taken by me or 2) if we were in company she would ask to check the photos and request the photographer to delete any that didn’t pass her unilateral censorship.
A friend of mine whose son has recently divorced a female NSP told me that her ex daughter_in_law had EXACTLY the same kind of eyes .. not black all the time but so apparent in lots of photos. We were just absolutely intrigued by it and I find it absolutely fascinating NSPs have this kind of physiological characteristic – but thank the Lord they do so, because it makes it a lot easier for us to spot them.
This website is brilliant and thank you Donna. I have learned so much about NSPs from you.
HI Donna, I love that you reposted this article. My husband and I were just discussing recently the phenomenon of “Sanpaku” eyes…it is based on how much white of the eyes is seen. These type of eyes are supposed to demonstrate varied states of mental illness, distress or even physical illness. There is a lot of info on the web about it. Really ties into this article. Anyone that I have suspected to be a sociopath or addict have these eyes. It never ceases to amaze me!
Thanks Joanie. Personally, I saw the empty eyes. The black eyes seems really scary.