Do ZOOM Calls Impoverish Neural Networks?

Recently I came across THIS STUDY out of NYU claiming that having a good listener in your life is a net positive for brain health (The study didn’t examine what BEING a good listener does for brain health. A number of other studies suggest being is more beneficial, which makes sense when you consider the greater amount of sensory networks necessarily recruited for listening). Here’s a short TED Talk with 25 million views that explains a lot about why that is so.

The research above didn’t detail what constitutes “good listening,” but there’s lots of research from the International Listening Association that suggests just hearing the words people speak offers access to only a small part of the message they’re offering (If you really want to go granular on what constitutes truly skillful listening, see The Tao of Listening trilogy below). Turns out you actually have to practice and grow neural network fibers in the temporal lobes and other connected network areas to improve listening skills, much as you might do when learning to play a violin or learning the names for different brain parts. And while I’ve read all kinds of studies assigning some percentage breakdown to verbal versus nonverbal communication (from 33% to 93%), what’s relevant here is that much of the nonverbal dimension is absent on the ZOOM platform.

We can’t, for example, generally see what people are doing with their hands. Is a foot tapping? Are their legs crossed or are they “manspreading?” We can’t see if pupils are dilating or cheeks are flushing. All these elements and more go into in-person communication, even though many of them are only taken in on a subconscious level.

Another factor to consider is that in everyday communication, we’re not able to look at ourselves at the same time as we’re looking at the person we’re conversing with. This distraction tends to fragment our attention, directing it first at the person we’re talking to, and then at our own image. Additionally, how many calls have we been on where the person’s eyes are looking down at their computer while they’re talking to us, making no real eye contact whatsoever (Interestingly, the newest iPhone comes with “eyetracking software” that automatically makes it look like you’re looking at the camera). How do we respond when someone in person makes little eye contact with us?

Last month I posted a TED talk by 7-year-old Molly Wright. Molly argued that her robust neural networks were very much the result of serve-and-return (contingent) communication. Whether you’re 7 or 70, I would argue that such communication is critical for enriched neural network development. While the verbal elements might be available to us on a ZOOM call, most often much of the nonverbal are not. Often, we end up with something Stanford researchers call ZOOM Fatigue. I would argue it’s more than simple fatigue. I would wager that excessive, imbalanced use of the ZOOM platform can result in significant neural impoverishment.

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