The very widespread diffusion of methods and tools suitable for carrying out remote work during the pandemic has allowed, among other things, to expand knowledge about the effects of the systematic and prevalent use of these tools on people. Recent research has led to the identification of a phenomenon now known as “Zoom fatigue”, an expression that summarizes and describes a series of difficulties posed by the exhausting sessions of video calls and videoconferencing which in many cases have replaced live interactions in the workplace, but not only.
According to a new study published by a research group at the University of Gothenburg and Stanford University, women spend more time overall than men in video meetings and have shorter breaks between video calls. The study, conducted on a sample of 10,591 people, also shows a prevalence of the feeling of being “physically trapped”, determined by having to stay in the frame, and anxiety related to the so-called “mirror effect” among women.
Researchers prepared a series of questions to formulate a questionnaire, based on a scale (ZEF, Zoom Exhaustion and Fatigue) that measures five different types of fatigue associated with video calls: general (general fatigue), social (need to be alone) , emotional (feeling overwhelmed), visual (symptoms of eye disorders) and motivational (lack of stimulation to start new activities). The researchers therefore found higher levels of fatigue among women (14 percent) than men (6 percent) for all five types of fatigue.
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Another of the stressful sensations considered by the study is the so-called “hyper-gaze”, a phenomenon perceived and described by people as the impression of being observed by everyone at all times. It is due to the fact that the main screen of video conferencing programs usually shows everyone's face while everyone looks towards their camera, regardless of individual concentration or specific attention paid to one person rather than another. And this feeling also applies to individual video calls, because the face of the colleague or colleague appears even larger and gives the impression that that person is half a meter away. From an “evolutionary” point of view, argues one of the authors of the study, such a short distance between two people – with their gaze fixed on each other – occurs live only in the event of a quarrel or mating.
The “mirror effect” had already been the subject of attention and research. As previous Zoom fatigue studies have shown, constantly seeing your image on the screen during a video conference tends to lengthen stressful self-assessment moments and heighten anxiety. “It's like a whole day spent with an assistant holding a mirror in front of you every time you interact with someone,” explained one of the authors of the study, Géraldine Fauville, professor of education, communication and learning sciences at the 'University of Gothenburg. Another factor that tends to increase fatigue levels is the concentration needed to pick up non-verbal signals in long-distance interactions. And consequently the greater the time spent on video calls and with short breaks between one and the other – as in the case of the women involved in the study – the greater the stress.
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According to Fauville, one of the objectives of future research should be to study the reasons for this type of inequality and provide the knowledge and tools to address them. The survey underlying the study also showed differences in the reactions of other groups of people: blacks showed greater fatigue than whites, although the difference is smaller than that found between people of different genders. Age difference was also a factor related to different trends in the Zoom fatigue experience, higher among younger ones.
The study does not provide definitive explanations regarding the increased Zoom fatigue among women. A different type of work carried out by women is among the hypotheses suggested to account for the longer duration of videoconferences and the shorter duration of breaks, even with the same number of meetings reported by both women and men in the sample. Findings from other recent research on the disproportionate impact of the pandemic on women, cited in the study and described as other potential factors to consider, refer to the varying burden of responsibility of women with respect to their role in childcare, childcare, greater economic difficulties and a different conflict with the image of one's own body.
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Among the suggestions shared by other researchers to try to reduce fatigue from Zoom is that of resorting to audio calls, when possible, to deactivate the auto-display function and to check more often how colleagues and colleagues are doing. work. However, Fauville stresses that “the responsibility for dealing with Zoom fatigue should not rest with individuals, as this could only intensify inequalities.” It would be better to use the research data to develop new protocols that can be adopted by employers to protect everyone from fatigue: foresee at least one day of the week without video calls, for example, or require breaks of at least ten minutes between meetings.
Some action to counter this phenomenon could also be taken by the same companies that own the most used videoconferencing tools. According to Jeremy Bailenson, one of the study's authors and director of the Virtual Human Interaction Lab at Stanford University, viewing your image during a video call should disappear after a few seconds by default. And another trick – useful to counteract the feeling of “hyper-gaze” – could be to limit the maximum size of the windows intended for viewing by other people.
