How to Overcome Zoom Fatigue

The COVID-19 pandemic forced millions of people to stay home to help stop the spread of the virus. Therefore, meeting in person for school or work became a thing of the past.  

Thanks to the intense separation measures and resonance with the new social distancing culture, one of the dozens of video conferencing services, Zoom, quickly rose to the top. 

Throughout May 2020, Zoom saw 200 million daily meeting participants. The following month, this figure rose to 300 million. This compares to 10 million in December 2019. Zoom remains a top-rated service even today. Now, everyone schedules remote meetings, hops on quick calls, and completes education requirements online.

The new normal has led to a recent turn of phrase: Zoom fatigue. Zoom fatigue is the feeling of exhaustion that you experience following a video conference call. Zoom fatigue has become so common that researchers from Stanford and other organizations are beginning to study its psychological effects on people.

Some causes for Zoom fatigue are excessive amounts of intense close-up eye contact, seeing yourself during zoom chats constantly, video chats dramatically reducing our normal mobility, and the cognitive load being much higher in video chats. 

The following are the top five ways to overcome Zoom fatigue. 

Shorten Meetings

Everyone has heard the saying, "This meeting could have been an email." This quote has taken on new meaning in light of the pandemic and the recent shift to remote work. Meeting length is not an indicator of their success or effectiveness.

Long meetings cause Zoom fatigue for many people. For one, when someone’s face is that close up during a long video meeting, our brains interpret it as an intense situation that could lead to conflict. 

“What’s happening, in effect, when you’re using Zoom for many, many hours is you’re in this hyper-aroused state,” Jeremy Bailenson, Stanford professor and founding director of the Stanford Virtual Human Interaction Lab (VHIL), said in a 2021 press release. 

Instead, keep meetings short and to the point, and consider using a different mode of communication whenever possible. If attendees can see they only have 20 minutes to get through a meeting, they will save time and get through the agenda quicker. 

Schedule Breaks

Company Zoom meetings make it difficult to break your day into manageable segments. Back-to-back Zoom meetings and other consecutive tasks can contribute to fatigue and exhaustion.

Taking regular breaks between calls is a must for alleviating Zoom fatigue. In the office, meetings allow you to pace, walk around the room, and stand while you're presenting. There's social pressure to stay within your camera frame on Zoom calls.

Give yourself five to ten-minute breaks during the longer Zoom calls. And for a 2-hour class, for example, take a 5-minute break every 30 minutes or so to look away from the camera. It’s harder to focus attention on a small screen than on a whole person in a classroom.

Avoid Multitasking

Many people think it’s easy to multitask and get more done in less time, but research shows that trying multiple things at once cuts into performance. Studies have found that switching tasks can cost you as much as 40% of your productive time. 

And researchers at Stanford summarized that people who multitask couldn’t remember things as well as their more singularly focused peers.

So you may think staying focused and blocking distractions causes your brain to work harder, but the opposite is true. Switching between tasks makes your brain eat up more glucose, making you feel exhausted and disoriented even after a small amount of multitasking.

Recent studies show multitasking has a physical, possibly permanent, impact on the brain’s structure. Instead, plan your day, remove everything from your desk and screen except the task at hand, learn to say no, and find a quiet place to work. 

Turn Off Self View

The amount of eye contact we engage in on video chats and the size of faces on screens is unnatural. On Zoom calls, everyone is looking at everyone all the time. And even if you don’t speak once in a meeting, you can still see faces staring at you. 

Additionally, knowing that others are seeing your video broadcast can heighten your awareness of being seen, and that awareness can induce anxiety and make it difficult to focus. It can also be exhausting.

Therefore, experts recommend taking Zoom out of the full-screen option and reducing the size of the Zoom window relative to the monitor to minimize face size. Also, turning off your self-view will help you have an easier time focusing on your work. 

Switch to Phone Calls or Email

Many people now treat video as the default for all communication. When communicating with coworkers or people outside your organization, you may feel obligated to send out a Zoom link instead. 

But besides causing Zoom fatigue, researchers say that video calls may not even be that effective for communication. In many Zoom meetings, people interrupt or talk to each other. And the temptation to check your phone or answer emails on the side is often too great. 

Therefore, phone calls or emails are far superior for conveying emotion and boosting group performance. In fact, communication experts say choosing phone calls over Zoom can help you deliver harsh feedback, eliminate confusion, and feel more emotionally in touch.