In an increasingly digital world, many of us might find ourselves feeling exhausted after a day filled with video calls. If that's you, you're not alone. Recent research has indicated that videoconferencing fatigue is a real phenomenon, not just a perception.
What Happened: A study conducted by Austrian scientists sheds light on this issue, as reported by The Register. The study delved into the effects of videoconferencing on 35 university students during a 50-minute lecture.
Published in Scientific Reports, a Nature Reports journal, the study used electroencephalogram (EEG) to measure brain activity and electrocardiography (ECG) to analyze heart rate effects. Surprisingly, the results pointed towards students attending the lecture in person feeling more alert, happier, and less fatigued than those who attended online.
EEG data from the study backed this finding, indicating increased brain activity in the students participating via videoconference, suggesting that more effort was required, potentially causing fatigue.
Why It Matters: The authors concluded that "Our study suggests that videoconferencing should be viewed as a supplementary form of communication, not a replacement for face-to-face interaction."
They also acknowledged the limitations of their study, including the academic setting and the relatively young average age of participants.
This research is part of a broader Austrian program named Techno Stress, which focuses on the negative effects of increased Information and Communication Technology (ICT) interaction. This program has already produced 20 papers, indicating an increased academic focus on the impact of our increasingly digital lifestyles.