CHAPEL HILL, N.C. (MarketWatch) — It’s not clear what it’s going to take to send gold investors into complete and utter despair, but contrarian theory won’t turn bullish on the yellow metal until they do.

It’s not as though gold investors haven’t given plenty of opportunity to become despondent. The precious metal is now in its fourth year of a major bear market, down more than 40% from its 2011 peak near $2,000 an ounce — including another drop of $22 on Tuesday.

And, yet, the gold timers I monitor act as though every gold rally is the beginning of a new bull market. According to contrarian analysis, a truly significant market bottom won’t be established until the gold timers stop being eager beavers, believing that every uptick means that happy days are here again.

Their eagerness to turn bullish was on display in September and October, when gold staged a near-$100 rally off its mid-September low. The average gold timer quickly threw in the towel on his previous bearishness and became more bullish than he had been in nearly a year. Contrarians, therefore, were not surprised that gold’s rally quickly petered out and that it is now back within shouting distance of its September low.

Consider the average gold timer’s recommended gold-exposure level (as represented by the Hulbert Gold Newsletter Sentiment Index, or HGNSI). It currently stands at minus 7%, which is 23 percentage points higher than during the September low. This comparison puts gold’s current level in an unfavorable light, since it means that the net effect of the gold market’s gyrations over the past two months has been little more than to cause a number of gold timers to turn bullish.

Contrarians, in effect, ask: If an HGNSI reading of minus 40% was justified when gold was in the low-$1,100s in mid-September, why not now? Clearly, the average gold timer is a lot less concerned about bullion’s outlook today than then — and that’s worrisome.

Just as bull markets like to climb a so-called “wall of worry,” according to contrarians, bear markets like to descend a “slope of hope.” Recent gold market sentiment certainly is more reminiscent of the latter than the former.

Contrarians argue that a more durable bottom comes when there is widespread bearishness that is stubbornly held on to in the wake of any initial rally off of a low. While there was a lot of bearishness at gold’s September low, the timers did not stubbornly hold on to it when gold began to rally.

So contrarians continue, patiently, to wait. Some day, the gold-timing community will throw in the towel in a big way, and that’s when contrarians will be looking to buy.