What Your Eye Color Reveals About Your Personality
People with the same eye color tend to share some common traits.
Kotin / Shutterstock Are you generally quick-witted or able to solve problems at the snap of a finger? Or maybe you know how to handle your stress like a pro? Or perhaps you've got a really wicked backhand?
If you relate to any of these, it could be due to the color of your eyes. In fact, science has found that our eye color can tell us a lot about who we are and also help determine our personality traits. We already know how much emotion the eyes can show, but it turns out that they also play a role in our personalities.
A study conducted at the Orebro University in Sweden found that the genes responsible for forming our brains' frontal lobes affect our eye color as well. Because of this, the scientists reason that people with the same common eye color may share personality traits.
And that isn't the only scientific study linking eye color to personality. Edinburgh University psychologist Dr. Anthony Fallone came to a similar conclusion when studying the subject.
“The eye is so closely linked neurologically to the brain that you might call it the only part of our brain you can see from the outside," Dr. Fallone said. "It seems to hold vital clues to our brain function.”
Researchers have found that the color of our eyes may hold significant insight into our behaviors, mental health, and tolerance to pain.
What does your eye color say about you?
Read on to learn about the personality traits associated with having brown, black, hazel, green, blue, and gray eyes.
If you have light-to-medium brown eyes
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Brown eyes are the most common in the world compared with blue and green.
This may be the world's most prevalent eye color — approximately 79% of the world population has some shade of brown eyes — but your personality is anything but ordinary.
People with brown eyes tend to be confident and assertive. They're also great at handling conflict because they're typically agreeable people who are willing to listen to other people's points of view before giving their own.
Researchers behind some studies, particularly one conducted at Georgia State University, say that the melanin that causes the brown hue in eyes makes people more receptive to alcohol, which means they get drunk quicker and may be more likely to be alcoholics. That said, later research showed the opposite to be true, and the jury appears to still be out on this one.
And while you may or may not be kind of a lightweight, you do have very quick reaction times, making you excel at sports like tennis.
If you have dark brown or black eyes
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Dark brown eyes are usually highly pigmented, sometimes causing them to look nearly black. Dark brown or black eyes have even more melanin than light or medium brown eyes, since the darker the eyes the more amount of melanin they will have.
If you have dark brown or black eyes, you likely share many of the same traits as people with light or medium brown eyes. However, you're probably even more confident than your brown-eyed companions.
People with this eye color are natural-born leaders and total bosses who are always ready to take on the world. If you have dark brown or black eyes, you're never one to follow the crowd — but you do expect the crowd to follow you without missing a beat.
If you have hazel eyes
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The folks at Utah Valley Eye Center explain that the unique coloring of hazel eyes "is a result of the combination of brown and amber with a unique scattering of light. For this reason, hazel eyes often appear to change colors; more green, amber, or brown depending on their environment."
The greenish-brown mix of hazel eyes is an uncommon color, as only 5% of the world population have amber or hazel green eyes — and that goes perfectly with your personality.
Hazel-eyed people are truly one-of-a-kind. Much like the unique color scheme of their eyes, no two personalities will ever really be anything alike. That's why it can be hard to pinpoint the exact traits of this eye color.
However, one common trait these people usually have is independence — which obviously meshes well with their distinctive eye color. You're also incredibly hard to read, but your mysteriousness is what really catches people's eyes. (We couldn't resist that one.)
If you have green eyes
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Only 2% of the world's population has green eyes. Many say green is the most exotic and seductive eye color, and apparently, science agrees.
In one study, 29% of participants associated green eyes with sexiness, while 25% think of people with green eyes as creative, and 20% consider them to be "a little devious."
And as is most appropriate for eyes the color of envy itself, of the 60% of study participants who wish they could change the color of their own eyes, 27% would choose green for their own if the option was available.
Of course, green-eyed people have more to offer than their strikingly attractive looks. The balance of melanin in green eyes contributes to a nice mix of brown-eye and blue-eye personality traits.
People with green eyes have the pleasant demeanor of their brown-eyed friends and the strength and carefulness that comes with blue eyes. Green-eyed people tend to be rather unpredictable, creative, and capable of taking care of business even when things get stressful.
If you have blue eyes
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Welcome to the world, blue-eyed people!
Researchers at Copenhagen University found that blue eyes are "a genetic mutation which took place 6-10,000 years ago and is the cause of the eye color of all blue-eyed humans alive on the planet today" — i.e., a relatively new phenomenon in the long history of human evolution.
Essentially, this meant that all blue-eyed people, who make up 8-10% of the world's population, are related, in that they all share a single ancestor in common.
The light blue hue of this eye color is sometimes associated with being soft and timid. However, blue-eyed people are actually the opposite of these things. In fact, people with blue eyes just might be the strongest of us all, as studies have found that people with blue eyes are better able to tolerate pain than those with any other eye color.
Dr. Inna Belfer of Pittsburgh University found that women with blue or green eyes "seemed to cope with childbirth the best. Not only did they become less anxious once their baby had arrived, they also were less likely to become depressed" than women with brown or hazel eyes.
Those with blue eyes know how to manage their emotions and can handle the negative ones remarkably well. Cautiousness is also in your nature, so you tend to evaluate people and situations carefully before ever diving in headfirst.
People often mistake these qualities for being untrustworthy or arrogant, but that's only because they didn't take the time to really look into your baby blues and see who you really are.
If you have gray eyes
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This eye color is a variation of blue eyes and is extremely rare. It's estimated that less than 1% of the world population has gray eyes.
If you have gray eyes, your personality traits may vary depending on whether your eyes are dark gray or light gray.
Light gray eyes have much less melanin than dark gray eyes. Those with light gray eyes tend to keep a guard up around their exterior. You won't let just anyone in, but once you do, you'll open yourself up to them completely and show them great affection.
Dark gray eyes, on the other hand, are much different. You have the most balanced personality of all the eye colors. You have two separate sides of your personality and you always know exactly which one to be and when to be it.
In other words, you can be a little good or you can be a little bad depending on what the situation calls for. You've always got a proverbial little devil and angel on your shoulder telling you what to do.
Sloane Solomon is a professional writer and editor who graduated from the University of Colorado with a Bachelors in English Writing.