Covid-19 - NonVerbal Communication Blog

Friends of the Nonverbal Communication Blog, this week we present the paper “Students’ perceptions of verbal and non-verbal communication behaviors during and after the Covid-19 pandemic”, by Dragomir, G. M.; Fărcasiu, M. A. and Simon, S. (2021), in which authors carry out a study to know how the modification of interpersonal relationships during and after Covid-19 has affected university students.

We all know that the Covid-19 pandemic has shaken and disrupted the physical health and emotional state of the whole world.

It has wreaked havoc on people’s lives and changed their behaviors in record time like never seen before.

As a result of the confinement, the separation, isolation and fear of the unknown, not only the psychological well-being of health workers at the forefront of risk has been impaired, but also in the general population.

In addition to all this, it became clear that the disease has also affected relationships between people by influencing the way we communicate with each other both verbally and nonverbally.

On an interpersonal level, communication has suffered a lot due to masks, which undoubtedly help our health and fight against the virus, but strain our daily face-to-face communication.

It has also suffered due to the rules of social distancing, which forced people to adapt to these new living conditions by adopting contactless meetings, or by changing in-person communication for online platforms such as Zoom or Microsoft Teams.

Previous studies have shown that personality traits such as extraversion and introversion play a huge role in the burnout result from working from home and using these platforms.

For example, extroverts were more exhausted than introverts, since the latter felt more comfortable in this configuration.

In addition, the level of intimacy achieved in video calls, with close-ups and direct gazes, is usually reserved for intimate relationships but it has become the new way of interacting with co-workers and acquaintances, and it seems to disrupt our productivity.

On the other hand, despite being necessary to protect our health, masks have a great disadvantage for interpersonal communication: they hide people’s facial expressions.

Having been studied from different perspectives, these expressions are considered the most important part of our non-verbal arsenal, since they communicate emotions and, in addition, they are a part of the body that we pay a lot of attention to in our interactions.

Nonverbal behavior has the function of helping to decode the interlocutor’s verbal message, as well as her/his feelings. Unfortunately, the masks cover the middle and lower area of the face, which partially and negatively affects this decoding.

This study sheds light on this moment in our lives when face masks and the virtual world have become our new normality.

It is focused on university students, very young and energetic people, and therefore very affected by the pandemic.

It analyzes the impact of this on young people and also how they think it will affect them in the future. That is, whether they will maintain some of the behaviors adopted during the pandemic in the future or not.

It was conducted using an online questionnaire between April 1 and May 30, 2021.

The results obtained regarding to verbal communication reveal that students seem to have adopted the rules very well and effortlessly when it comes about switching to the online world, thanks to being already accustomed to using technology.

By wearing masks, to make themselves being understood better, students seem to have got accustomed to repeat sentences sometimes, using the voice, its pitch, and volume as compensation. In addition, they mentioned focusing more on the upper part of the face, sometimes exaggerating the movements of these areas. They try to listen more accurately and use more or bigger gestures.

Some of the respondents reported having enjoyed social distancing rules at some point, which is consistent with the findings previously mentioned about extraversion and intraversion.

On the other hand, they admit that some new practices, such as greeting each other in a different way in the future or exaggerating the movements of the upper face area and make them livelier, will probably leave a mark on their future behavior.

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Friends of the Nonverbal Communication Blog, this week we present the paper “Physical distancing and the perception of interpersonal distance in the Covid-19 crisis” by Welsch, R.; Wessels, M.; Bernhard, C.; Thönes, S. and von Castell, C. (2021), in which authors investigate whether variations in the perception of interpersonal distance due to Covid-19 crisis exist, and, in general, how this matter has affected social proxemic.

The Covid-19 pandemic has led to the implementation of drastic, omnipresent and needed prevention measures in order to stop the infection risk.

As one of the most dangerous situations are face-to-face social interactions, social distancing is one of the main measures proposed by governments.

To talk about this matter, we need to explain the most known and used proxemic measures first.

Intimate space exists for the romantic or sexual partner and for the family, and it’s between 0 and 45 centimeters.

Then, there is personal space, only to be entered by close friends, and it’s between 45 and 120 centimeters.

When it comes about social interaction with strangers, the distance is called social space and it’s between 120 and 365 centimeters.

And last, there is public space, which is between 365 and 762 centimeters and it’s the distance we keep when we are in public, maybe in the street or an open space.

Authors talk about different hypotheses in the paper.

First, they wonder if physical distance requirements change the social norm, and thus increase interpersonal distance even after the Covid-19 pandemic.

Then, there is a second hypothesis, that is whether exposure to social isolation and loneliness, such as the lockdown context, affects to interpersonal distance preferences.

Lastly, they explore if the effects persist after the nation-wide restrictions were lifted.

In order to that, authors carried out a study with a sample of 186 German people, due to Germany has been one of the European countries that has most suffer the effects of the pandemic.

The survey started one week after the first lockdown in Germany. At that time, and interpersonal distance of 150 centimeters to 200 was mandated by the sanitary authorities and the government.

The questions in the survey were focused on the perception of the interpersonal distance before, during and after the pandemic.

Subjects deemed a physical distancing norm of 172 centimeters, which is appropriate during the pandemic.

When it comes about calculating the mean difference between the interpersonal distance before and after the pandemic, and then during it, the results showed only 6 centimeters. Thus, the first hypothesis that authors proposed would be confirmed.

It looks that, at the end of 2020, subjects retrospectively reported that preferred to keep larger distances than the ones before the pandemic. This confirms the authors’ hypotheses, but also manifests how simple and easy is for people to adapt to the new prevention norms when it comes about proxemic.

It is suggested that the perceived individual risk of infection also affects the perceived importance of physical distancing. This would be coherent due to the sanitary situation.

An interesting information obtained is that exists an important discomfort when interpersonal distance is reduced approximately 10 centimeters or more.

Moreover, authors consider that after the pandemic, these customs are being maintained over time, and people prefer to keep the distance recommended by the sanitary authorities in the worst moments of the crisis, even when these have already been left behind.

Therefore, the hypotheses that authors proposed, make sense according to the obtained results.

As any other research, there are some limitations in this study that should be considered. For instance, that the study sample was non-representative of the German population, since two-thirds, which is the majority of the participants, were university students, and the mean age of the sample was around 30.

Future research, point out the authors, should focus on correct this and other limitations that appear in the paper.

Besides, it would be interesting to study why exactly the interpersonal distance recommended at the beginning of this pandemic is still preferred, even when the Covid-19 crisis is not at its peak.

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