“Zoom Fatigue”: Why We’re Exhausted
With the shift from office banter to zoom meetings, many of us are exhausted. Perhaps it’s ennui? Boredom? General discontent? Here’s another to add to the list: Zoom fatigue. Communication is a synchrony of talking, gestures, movement, and timing. Our subconscious is working in overdrive, trying to match each other.
photo by: Chris Montgomery
Jeremy Bailenson recently published an article that has given people validation that they, indeed, should be exhausted, if they’re on zooms all day most days. While it’s not a scientific study, the paper is practical, and draws on theories around phenomena that so many of us are experiencing, with the relentlessness of the pandemic.
I see children, adolescents, and adults. Across the board, zoom fatigue and videos are not helping people feel more socially connected. For children, it’s hard to know when to speak up, when to chat. Remember when you were a kid and there were scenarios in which you wanted to raise your hand, but didn’t? Or times when you didn’t blink at speaking up? Kids are trying to navigate the new social norms and ways of communicating online. They aren’t alone. Adults feel this too. I volunteered to write a position statement on police intervention for children with mental health issues for a national professional organization. For an entire hour, I stared at my screen of 8 people I had never met before, silent. Everyone else spoke except me. While I’m typically a listener anyhow, it’s rare that I would say nothing when everyone else contributed to the conversation. It was 8:30pm and I just put both kids to bed. I didn’t have the energy to be “on”. Here are 4 reasons why you may also feel exhausted from a day of video meetings:
The sizing is abnormal
Faces on screens are huge! And a floating head reminds us of t.v. We have this close up of another person’s face- making eye contact ever more important. Eyes are the window to the soul. When we’re on zoom, we want to show people we’re engaged and connected, so our eyes are fixated on the pixelation of another’s eyes. It’s exhausting to stare so intently into someone’s eyes. Larger faces also look closer and can feel more threatening or just uncomfortably close. It’s not just the face though. In the past few months, I’ve realized that one patient is 3rd trimester pregnant (and never mentioned it, which is an important point for our therapy), and another is severely underweight with anorexia in denial.
2. People are more self-aware
When you have your own video also showing, you’re watching yourself too. It’s strange to be walking around, talking to people, with a mirror constantly in your face. Halfway through sessions, I’ll notice people fixing their hair as if looking in a mirror, or turning away from the screen when they’re crying. Because who wants to look into a mirror when you’re crying?
There’s also the self-awareness that comes not just from watching yourself, but from not having feedback readily available. I recently did a training for the State Department and couldn’t tell if people were still with me. I ask a question. Silence. I was perhaps literally talking to myself. But then the feedback comes back 3 days later about how fantastic it was. But in the moment, it’s pretty disheartening to think everyone has left the room!
3. We aren’t moving
There isn’t the natural movement and fidgeting when we’re focused on making sure the other knows we are listening, staring into a stationary screen. For many of my patients, I’ve encouraged them to take me off video and walk outside during our session. They feel better because they’re exercising, out in nature, and feel connected. All of which have scientific support in mitigating depression.
4. Our cognitive load is higher
Our subconscious minds are working in overdrive. I just had a meeting where the person was shaking their had so much in affirmation of what I was saying that she hurt her neck trying to show me she agrees. We are inadvertently spending more time on the “show” aspect - trying to show connection and engagement, which ironically takes away from being present and connected. As a psychiatrist, it’s been harder to read faces - was that a tear in his eye or a smudge on my screen?
Hopefully we’ll have more studies that come out of the pandemic era, on the psychological implications of primarily video conferencing. Many people worked remotely pre-pandemic, but now the world has taken away most abilities to socialize in-person, to balance out the constancy of videos. We walk outside and are met with masks covering half of our face, so we don’t see the half-smiles of strangers walking past us. And we know those little acts can add to our sense of belonging. I’ll also hope to see more studies on the impact on our communication skills. Normally, as a psychiatrist in person, I give people space and time, to allow more moments of silence. But when I do that via zoom, it’s more awkward and one of us jumps in to fill that space. Many emotions have always been uncomfortable to sit with, but now we layer on the scruiny and cognitive load of constant video communication and it’s slightly more unbearable.
So what can you do? Try re-sizing your zoom screen so it doesn’t take up your entire screen, turning off your own video so you aren’t staring into a mirror, move around - fidgeting is okay!, and know that you aren’t alone. If you’re feeling zoom fatigue, you’re in good company.
Here’s more, including my interview with the Washington Post on Bailenson’s article on Zoom Fatigue. Or check out other Mental Health field notes