How to Enhance Magic Tricks with Your Eyes
Psychological insights for magicians
Sometimes, you perform an incredible magic trick, and the reaction from the spectators isn't as big as you hoped. You might perform the same trick as another magician and believe you're performing it exactly the same way, but it elicits totally different levels of reactions.
The point is that sometimes, the trick alone isn't enough. You may need an atmosphere that enhances the magic effect and fosters a strong connection with your spectators. The more connected your audience feels to you, the more they remember the experience fondly. One element that can be beneficial in achieving this is the psychology of eye contact.
Why eye contact? Eye contact has a profound impact on human emotions. It triggers a release of oxytocin, the bonding hormone, and fosters a sense of connection and empathy. By engaging spectators on an emotional level, magicians can intensify the impact of their illusions, leaving a lasting impression and a sense of shared experience.
So why not take a moment to set aside the deck of cards and learn a new way to enhance your magic, transforming your tricks into miracles?
Six curiosities on eye contact from psychology
- The best form of eye contact is not continuous but somewhat intermittent: moments of eye contact should alternate with moments of looking away. The average preferred duration of eye contact is three seconds (and no more than nine seconds).
- We get an idea about their personality based on how much people meet our eyes or look away when we talk to them. Indeed, studies demonstrate how, in job interviews, the way the interviewer's eyes meet those of the applicant ascribes a specific character to the latter and, therefore, can determine hiring or rejection.
- Eye contact catches and holds our attention, making us less aware of what is happening around us. You've undoubtedly had the experience of connecting through a gaze with someone across a noisy room: the world fades away, and you share a momentary connection.
- Locking eyes with someone triggers a cascade of brain activities, signalling that we are engaging with another person actively looking at us. This realization heightens our awareness that the other person possesses thoughts, intentions, and a unique perspective. Interestingly, studies reveal that this effect occurs even when we look at a portrait that seems to be making eye contact, demonstrating the powerful impact of this phenomenon.
- When someone looks directly at us, it interrupts our ability to remember and use information, imagine things, and control our thoughts by filtering out irrelevant details. You might have personally experienced these effects when you looked away from someone to concentrate better on your thoughts or words, even if you weren't consciously aware of it.
- In Western cultures, people who make effective eye contact are perceived by us as more intelligent, conscientious and sincere, and we are more likely to believe what they say.
How to use eye contact to enhance your magic
How can we use all these elements to improve our magic performances? Here are two toolkits from psychology that can help you make the most of eye contact in magic.
1: A toolkit for close-up magic
In these situations, where you interact with individuals one to one, some precautions need to be taken.
Avoid fixating directly on the eyes. When interacting with a person, there's an unconscious tendency to shift your gaze from one eye to the other, which the listener interprets as the speaker's insecurity. A piece of advice is to look right between the person's eyes. People perceive that you look into their eyes confidently, and they feel more engaged.
