Nonverbal Overload: A Theoretical Argument for the Causes of Zoom Fatigue

In this episode I unpack Bailenson’s (2021) publication titled “Nonverbal overload: A theoretical argument for the causes of Zoom fatigue,” which describes four potential causes for Zoom fatigue.

  • Welcome back to another episode of the

    CSK8 podcast my name is jared o'leary

    each week alternates between an

    interview with a guest or a solo episode

    where i unpack some scholarship

    in this particular episode i am

    unpacking the paper titled

    nonverbal overload colon a theoretical

    argument for the causes of zoom fatigue

    this was written by jeremy in balenson

    now this particular paper is available

    for free and you can find a direct link

    to it in the show notes which you can

    find by clicking the link in the

    description

    or the app that you're listening to this

    on or by simply going to jaredlery.com

    when you click on the article title for

    this particular paper it'll take you

    directly to the paper

    and if you click on the author's last

    name it'll take you to their google

    scholar profile so you can check out

    more publications by this particular

    author

    alright so here's the abstract for this

    particular paper quote

    for decades scholars have predicted that

    video conference technology will disrupt

    the practice

    of commuting daily to and from work and

    will change the way people socialize

    in 2020 the copen 19 pandemic forced a

    drastic increase in the number of video

    conference meetings

    and zoom became the leading software

    package because it was free

    robust and easy to use while the

    software has been an essential tool for

    productivity

    learning and social interaction

    something about being on video

    conference all day seems particularly

    exhausting

    and the term zoom fatigue got on quickly

    in this article i focus on non-verbal

    overload

    as a potential cause for fatigue and

    provide four arguments outlining how

    various aspects of the current zoom

    interface likely led to psychological

    consequences

    the arguments are based on academic

    theory and research but also have yet to

    be directly tested in the context of

    zoom

    and require future experimentation to

    confirm instead of

    indicting the medium my goal is to point

    out these design flaws to isolate

    research areas for social scientists and

    to suggest design

    improvements for technologists end quote

    alright so if i had to summarize this

    particular paper i would say that this

    paper describes four potential causes

    for zoom fatigue

    now one thing i want to point out in the

    abstract is this is not a study this is

    not empirical research this is

    written by somebody who has done

    empirical research and quite frankly has

    done a lot of research

    in publications the way i read this

    particular paper

    is this author is basically saying hey

    we are

    collectively as a society creating a

    term called zoom fatigue

    and the author is trying to figure out

    what might be causing that so-called

    zoom fatigue and what can we do about it

    so they are going to highlight some

    prior research and prior theories that

    might be related

    and talk about it in relation to video

    conferencing specifically through

    zoom as a platform now while i read some

    of the main

    summaries of this particular paper i'm

    going to talk about okay so

    if this is a thing which it may or may

    not be what can we

    as cs educators do about this if we are

    doing remote teaching and learning

    all right so there's a short intro and

    basically the intro is saying that

    hey we don't really have a lot of

    studies that are looking at

    spending multiple hours a day on a

    particular medium through video

    conferencing

    and so this paper is going to highlight

    some theoretical explanations

    based on prior work that might explain

    why people are feeling fatigued when

    engaging in

    zoom or other video conferencing

    platforms for several hours a day

    alright so the first section is called

    eye gaze at a close distance

    all right so here's a quote from pdf

    page two quote

    on zoom behavior ordinarily reserved for

    close relationships

    such as long stretches of direct eye

    contact

    and faces seeing close up has suddenly

    become the way we interact with casual

    acquaintances co-workers and even

    strangers

    there are two separate components to

    unpack here the size of faces on the

    screen

    and the amount of time the viewer is

    seeing the front on view of another

    person's face

    which simulates eye contact end quote so

    the point that the author is making is

    that when you're engaging in

    a like the brady bunch style

    conversation where you have a bunch of

    different squares where everybody is all

    looking into their cameras or looking at

    their screen which might have their

    camera

    right above or below or to the side of

    it this makes it so that it looks like

    everybody is staring at you

    all the time when in actuality they're

    probably looking at their screen

    maybe looking at their email or just

    zoning out whatever

    now the author points out that if we

    were engaging in a meeting let's say

    with like 20 people

    arbitrary number at any given moment not

    everybody is going to be staring at the

    person who is actually speaking

    people might be looking off to the side

    people might be looking at the notes

    that they're taking on a notepad

    people might be looking at a device that

    they're typing into

    or they might just be looking away from

    the person who's speaking but still

    actively listening

    so when engaging with a conversation

    one-on-one

    or in in group settings there is

    significantly less

    eye gaze as people aren't always staring

    at you

    while you were speaking or when you were

    speaking to somebody else

    now another thing in this section the

    author points out is depending on the

    size of the monitor that you are using

    it's going to change how large the face

    is of the person that is

    on the other end of the video conference

    platform so if you're in

    a group with one person it might look

    like they are like sitting right in

    front of you if you have a large monitor

    like

    really close to you if you are

    communicating with somebody who

    is in a group call and there's like

    let's say 50 people on it

    and you see 50 different squares

    different tiles and you have a small

    monitor

    they're going to appear very small and

    very far away and the author is arguing

    that if the person appears really close

    to you

    this kind of comes across as a more

    intimate

    personal distance that is typically

    reserved for close family members and

    friends etc

    here's a quote from pages two and three

    of the pdf

    quote but with zoom all people get the

    front on views of all

    other people non-stop this is similar to

    being in a crowded subway car

    while being forced to stare at the

    person you are standing very close to

    instead of looking down or at your phone

    on top of this it is as if

    everyone in the subway car rotated their

    bodies such that their faces were

    oriented toward your eyes

    end quote okay so what can we as cs

    educators do about this

    so one thing is we might be able to

    change the angle of the camera that

    we are using so for example if you watch

    a lot of like twitch

    streamers or video game streamers they

    will often have their camera

    off to an angle off to the side and

    sometimes they'll have a monitor over

    there so while they're gaming they will

    look

    straight on at the game that they are

    playing and then when they want to

    communicate directly to their chat or

    people who are watching

    they will physically turn their head

    look at the other monitor or the camera

    and then we'll speak directly into the

    camera there so this makes it so they

    are not staring directly at

    their audience the entire time but

    instead are looking at their screen and

    then when they want to look over and

    give that impression of the direct eye

    contact

    it will physically turn their head and

    look at their camera so if you have

    an external camera this is one thing

    that you could potentially do

    to make it so that you're not having it

    appear as though you are staring at

    somebody the entire time

    you can be more intentional with when

    you are in fact trying to give direct

    eye contact

    now if you don't have an external camera

    but you do have an external monitor you

    can flip that so you can have it so that

    you are looking at your external monitor

    which might be off to the side and then

    turn your head to look at your

    like laptop that might have a built-in

    camera to give that direct eye contact

    when you want to now when it comes to

    the

    the the size of people who you are

    meeting with

    you can minimize your window or at least

    make it smaller

    and make it so that they don't appear

    really large on the screen so i like to

    when i'm engaging in one-on-one

    conversations

    make it so that the person is very small

    and i move that window

    right to the top of my my monitor and

    put it right underneath where my camera

    is at

    so when i'm looking at my screens

    i will be looking at the different

    windows and like typing different stuff

    in and when i want to look directly at

    somebody

    i will look up at their small box of

    where they are at and that happens to be

    right below my camera so it gives the

    impression that i'm now providing direct

    eye contact

    when i am actually looking at their

    little video square instead of looking

    at one of the open windows on my screen

    another thing regarding eye gaze by the

    way that the author didn't really

    mention

    i also block the blue light that comes

    out of my monitors because i am working

    on my computer pretty much all day long

    and so i will enable the

    night light mode and set that to the

    maximum setting which gives this like

    orangish

    tint to my screen and honestly it makes

    it so that my eyes aren't as exhausted

    while looking at a screen all day long

    this does mess with the coloring of

    things so if i'm working on something

    that requires me to look at the coloring

    of the screen then i will just turn it

    off temporarily

    watch it or engage with whatever it is

    that i'm doing and then i will turn it

    back on

    because it does help me you can also get

    eyeglasses

    if that's something of interest to you

    just make sure you actually look online

    to make sure that

    it does what it's supposed to do and

    it's not just a hunk of plastic that you

    might be paying a lot of money for all

    right so that's the eye gaze at a close

    distance

    discussion so the next section in this

    paper is titled cognitive load

    so the basic gist of it can be

    summarized in this particular sentence

    that's on page three of the pdf quote on

    zoom

    nonverbal behavior remains complex but

    users need to work harder to send and

    receive signals

    in quote so there are a lot of

    non-verbal things that we need to

    consider when

    engaging in video conferencing like

    engaging in zoom

    so the author mentions like centering

    oneself in the center of the camera's

    view

    nodding in an exaggerated way to make it

    clear that people can see that you

    agree or disagree or whatever looking

    directly into the camera

    and trying to make some eye contact when

    speaking in addition the author cites a

    study that found that people speak

    fifteen

    percent louder one five percent louder

    when interacting on video

    and then if you're doing this all day

    long this can be even just

    straining on your voice so in addition

    to sending some

    non-verbal cues the author also mentions

    that we have to work harder when

    receiving non-verbal cues

    from video conferencing platforms here's

    a quote from page three

    quote for example in a face-to-face

    meeting a quick

    side long glance where one person darts

    their eyes to another has a social

    meaning

    and a third person watching this

    exchange likely encode this meaning

    in zoom a user might see a pattern in

    which on the grid it seems like one

    person glanced at another

    however that is not what actually

    happened since people often don't have

    the same grids

    even if the grids were kept constant it

    is far more likely the glancing person

    just got a calendar reminder on their

    screen or a chat message

    users are constantly receiving nonverbal

    cues that would have a specific meaning

    in a face-to-face context but have

    different meanings on

    zoom in quote so in other words somebody

    might be responding to something that

    has nothing to do with what you or

    somebody else is saying they might be

    looking at something else they might be

    browsing

    tick-tock or looking on youtube or

    responding to somebody else that's in

    the room that you can't see who's off

    camera etc

    because we are missing that context we

    are

    engaging in a higher amount of cognitive

    load because we're trying to like fill

    in those gaps and figure out well why

    did they just give that non-verbal

    signal

    in addition because zoom tends to focus

    on

    upper body non-verbal cues so like for

    example

    you don't necessarily see a person

    standing or sitting

    entirely all we see is from like the

    chest up this makes it so that we are

    missing some cues related to body

    posture

    or whether or not their legs are crossed

    or uncrossed whether or not somebody is

    slouching

    etc so we're focusing all this attention

    on upper body nonverbal cues and are

    unable to

    see some of the other non-verbal cues

    that we would normally see in person or

    might see okay so as cs educators what

    can we do about this so one thing that

    we might be able to do is just be aware

    that some of our nonverbal cues

    might be coming across in ways that are

    unintended so maybe posting in the chat

    while somebody else is talking

    hey i really agreed with that comment

    that susie just made just to make it

    clear who your non-verbal signals are

    directed at so the next section of this

    paper is titled an all-day

    mirror and here's a quote from page four

    of the pdf quote

    imagine in the physical workspace for

    the entirety of an eight-hour day

    an assistant followed you around with a

    handheld mirror and for every single

    task you did and every conversation you

    had

    they made sure you could see your own

    face in that mirror this sounds

    ridiculous but in essence

    this is what happens on zoom calls even

    though one can change the settings to

    hide self

    view the default is that we see our own

    real-time camera feed

    and we stare at ourselves throughout

    hours of meetings per day

    end quote now the author mentions that

    there's been studies going on for

    decades about

    what happens when people look at

    themselves in the mirror and they tend

    to be more evaluative

    of seeing themselves in the mirror so

    while this can lead to better

    social behaviors this can also be

    stressful for some people

    so for example the author mentions that

    there's a study that found

    that this self-focus might actually

    quote

    prime women to experience depression end

    quote from page four so this is

    something that we need to be aware of

    so one of the things that we might need

    to do when working with students or

    colleagues is to simply demonstrate

    and explain how you can turn off this

    self view for people who want to turn it

    off now i will say that i actually

    prefer to keep mine on

    i'm aware that you're able to turn it

    off and i intentionally turn it on

    because my non-verbal cues tend to look

    upset when i'm just thinking

    likely from all my years on drumline

    where we were told to not smile

    but because i'm better able to see that

    now i'm able to recognize oh my

    nonverbal cues come across in a way that

    i don't intend

    and i'm able to course correct with that

    or explain hey

    i'm just thinking right now i promise

    i'm not mad at you so for me this has

    actually been beneficial but for some

    people it might be

    detrimental so something that we should

    be aware of and honestly is a pretty

    easy fix

    just right clicking and then click the

    option to hide the self view alright so

    the last section of this paper is titled

    reduced mobility

    so here's a quote from pdf page four

    quote

    even in situations where one is not tied

    to the keyboard the cultural norms are

    to stay centered within the camera's

    view

    frustum and to keep one's face large

    enough for others to see

    in essence users are stuck in a very

    small physical cone

    and most of the time this equates to

    sitting down and staring straight ahead

    during face-to-face meetings people move

    they pace stand up

    and stretch doodle on a notepad get up

    to use a chalkboard even walk over to

    the water cooler to refill their glass

    end quote so the author says that one of

    the things that we can do is simply turn

    off the camera or simply go to a phone

    call

    when able to as this can make it so you

    can be more mobile something that i

    would also like to add is i am

    frequently found in meetings walking on

    a treadmill

    so i built a treadmill desk where i

    basically

    took a tv stand mounted it above my

    treadmill

    made it so that i could set my laptop on

    the arms of the treadmill

    by using a long drum pad and then

    connect that to a monitor that i put on

    top of

    the tv stand that's mounted on the wall

    and that makes it so that i can walk

    during meetings

    this is really helpful for me some of

    the things that i've also done

    is i have turned off my camera and will

    be like on my rowing machine

    or on an exercise bike or simply

    on the ground stretching while in a

    meeting this makes it so that i'm able

    to be much more mobile and move around

    but another thing that i like to do at

    least when i'm hosting meetings is

    do the pomodoro method using 5010

    approach we might work for 50 minutes

    and then take a 10 minute break

    and then that 10 minute break you can do

    whatever you want get up move around

    stretch

    do jumping jacks hands hands whatever

    and then we come back and continue for

    another 15 minutes five zero

    and then take another 10 minute break

    this is how i tend to work throughout

    the day

    so if i'm not on the treadmill desk and

    i'm working on my desktop

    i will work for 50 minutes and then i'll

    take a 10 minute break where i walk on

    the treadmill

    and read a book or listen to a podcast

    or even drum on the pad

    that is resting on top of the treadmill

    so this has been really helpful for me

    in terms of getting me moving throughout

    the day and i highly recommend it for

    anyone else

    interested in increasing their mobility

    while engaging a lot of video

    conferencing

    all right so those are the four main

    areas in this particular article

    again this is not an empirical article

    based on a research study

    but it is still very valuable to think

    about how

    prior research and frameworks might

    inform this feeling of

    zoom fatigue it might help us better

    understand what we can do to make it a

    little bit better

    working remotely or teaching remotely

    alright so normally i would end these

    episodes sharing some of my own

    lingering thoughts and questions but for

    this one i'm going to end with a

    question of what other strategies do you

    have

    for decreasing zoom fatigue if you have

    some other strategies that you highly

    recommend for others to consider

    please consider sharing them on twitter

    on facebook wherever

    email carrier pigeon so for example you

    can use hashtags

    on twitter such as csk8 and include a

    link to this paper or this podcast that

    kind of

    unpacks potential causes of zoom fatigue

    if you would like some resources that

    are related to

    remote learning please check out the

    resources section in

    the show notes i'll include some links

    in there and please consider sharing

    this with somebody who might benefit

    from hearing this particular episode

    and with that that concludes this week's

    episode of the csk8 podcast i hope

    you're all staying safe and are having a

    wonderful week thank you so much for

    listening


Abstract

“For decades, scholars have predicted that videoconference technology will disrupt the practice of commuting daily to and from work and will change the way people socialize. In 2020, the Covid-19 pandemic forced a drastic increase in the number of videoconference meetings, and Zoom became the leading software package because it was free, robust, and easy to use. While the software has been an essential tool for productivity, learning, and social interaction, something about being on videoconference all day seems particularly exhausting, and the term “Zoom Fatigue” caught on quickly. In this article, I focus on nonverbal overload as a potential cause for fatigue and provide four arguments outlining how various aspects of the current Zoom interface likely lead to psychological consequences. The arguments are based on academic theory and research, but also have yet to be directly tested in the context of Zoom, and require future experimentation to confirm. Instead of indicting the medium, my goal is to point out these design flaws to isolate research areas for social scientists and to suggest design improvements for technologists.”


Author Keywords

Videoconferencing, nonverbal behavior, mutual gaze, interpersonal distance, computer-mediated communication


My One Sentence Summary

This paper describes four potential causes for Zoom fatigue.


Some Of My Lingering Questions/Thoughts


Resources/Links Relevant to This Episode



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