Abstract
Keywords
Introduction
At the beginning of the first training session, the trainer asks us to name the issues that concern us most. After a round of introductions by the nine participants, it is clear that the ‘background’ of the video is the main concern for most of us. ‘Gestures’ come second, and ‘clothing’, third.
I wrote this ethnographic fieldnote during a training course in spring 2021. The course taught participants how to participate in work-related videoconferences, which they now took part in on a daily basis following the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. I was surprised to find that the participants’ concerns were not mainly about using the software applications, but rather about their bodies and physical surroundings. In fact, the training sessions provided rules and strategies for using bodies and places in front of the screen to present oneself on the screen. How can we account for these rules and strategies in empirical and theoretical ways? How can we grasp the interweaving of the virtual and physical that is at its core?
These questions are important, because digital media such as videoconferencing tools create a hybrid form of sociality in which participants find themselves in a virtual and a physical situation at the same time. Although some researchers have explicitly pointed out this aspect (e.g. Ellebrecht and zur Nieden, 2020; Hirschauer, 2014; Roth and Laut, 2023), its consequences for the formation of digital co-presence have not been sufficiently clarified, neither theoretically nor empirically. As this article argues, when studying the impact of digital technologies on co-presence and other social practices, it is crucial to explore how their use interconnects virtual and physical realms in novel ways by linking digital media, human bodies and local spatial artefacts (Hine, 2015; Marres, 2017; Schönian, 2011). Indeed, acknowledging that participants in digital interactions find themselves in both virtual and physical situations simultaneously, allows us to conceptualise this simultaneity as a performative challenge.
In order to explore this challenge in empirical and theoretical ways, I propose the concept of
By introducing the concept of synthetic involvement, the article contributes to two strands of research. First, to theories of digital co-presence that are driven by a phenomenological focus on the experienced and felt dimensions of the phenomenon (Campos-Castillo and Hitlin, 2013; Döbler and Schmidl, 2024; Grabher et al., 2018; Zhao, 2003, 2015). However, scenes such as that described in the fieldnote above imply that digital co-presence is not only felt and experienced, but also a matter of performances that entangle media, bodies and spaces. Hence, the notion synthetic involvement provides a performative perspective, which is enriched with ideas from both practice theory (Hui et al., 2016; Reckwitz, 2002; Schatzki et al., 2001) and new materialism (Coole and Frost, 2010; Ingold, 2007; Kalthoff et al., 2015). This allows us to take into account how technical things (e.g. a webcam), material places (e.g. a living space) as well as human bodies are enacted and entangled in the performance of social presence in digital interactions.
Second, the analysis contributes to the interdisciplinary literature on the use of videoconferencing tools, which has focused on both the workplace as well as socialising with friends and family. With regard to the latter, experienced users have indeed developed routines and tactics for staging bodies and physical surroundings in video meetings (e.g. Clarke-Salt, 2017; Greschke, 2022; Licoppe and Morel, 2012, 2014; Longhurst, 2013, 2016; Miller and Sinanan, 2014; Neustaedter et al., 2013). Work-related contexts, in contrast, are characterised by much more uncertainty, anxiety and disorientation in this regard (Longhurst, 2016), especially since the pandemic-driven expansion of videoconferencing with colleagues or clients (Hacker et al., 2020; Karl et al., 2022; Raible et al., 2023; Waizenegger et al., 2020). Thus, the concept of synthetic involvement sheds light on the socio-technical management of these uncertainties and opens up new perspectives on issues such as the planning of the ‘stage setting’ or privacy concerns in (work-related) videoconferencing. The article demonstrates this by examining a site that has received little attention in the literature: training courses that explain and teach rules and practices for self-presentation in videoconferencing.
Concepts of Digital Co-Presence
In our everyday understanding, and in the understanding of most sociologists, social presence has long been associated with ‘the immediate physical presence of the other’ (Goffman, 1959: 8). At present, the conceptual equation of social presence with the immediate physical proximity of participants is outdated: technologies such as videoconferencing tools allow us to be present to others without being physically close to them. As a result, digital modes of interaction have fuelled a debate in sociology and other social sciences over the last decade about how to theorise digital co-presence without tying it to physical co-presence (Campos-Castillo and Hitlin, 2013; Döbler and Schmidl, 2024; Grabher et al., 2018; Houben, 2018; Knorr Cetina, 2009; Meyer, 2014; Zhao, 2003).
These attempts include concepts such as ‘sense of being with others’ (Zhao, 2003: 452), ‘mutual awareness’ (Grabher et al., 2018: 249) or ‘mutual entrainment’ (Campos-Castillo and Hitlin, 2013: 169). The strength of these ideas is that they go beyond the misleading equation of social presence plus immediate physical proximity. They all argue that social presence is not tied to physical proximity, but to the mutual interpretation and treatment of the spatially distant participants as co-present others. Social presence is thus understood primarily as ‘felt presence’ (Döbler and Schmidl, 2024: 9–10), as a sense of mutual awareness and accessibility for communication and emotional connection, even in online environments.
However, most of these conceptual proposals tend to disembody and dematerialise digital interactions. They neglect that the digitalised presence of others (e.g. in a videoconference), is not only felt and experienced, but also a matter of embodied and material performances. These performances take place in a hybrid form of sociality in which participants find themselves in a virtual and a physical situation at the same time.
A framework for understanding digital co-presence that shifts attention to the simultaneous blending of a virtual and a physical situation is the concept of the ‘synthetic situation’ (Knorr Cetina, 2009). Synthetic situations are characterised by face-to-screen interactions and a territorial distance between the participants. Individuals thus produce sociality through acts of ‘response presence’, responding to distant others and/or to a shared object of observation in a virtual environment (such as a financial market streamed onto the screen).
Indeed, the term ‘synthetic’ emphasises the increasing simultaneity of virtual and physical constellations of co-presence. If this emphasis is to be taken seriously, digital interactions should be conceptualised as a synthesis, a simultaneous mixing of online and offline environments. However, Knorr Cetina largely leaves open the question of how this synthesis affects and involves physically situated bodies, things and places (Hirschauer, 2014). As Laube (2017, 2019) has shown, digital practices of financial trading do indeed shape the body as an epistemic instrument of market observation. However, when it comes to investigating the ways in which bodies and places are involved in the synthetic performance of social presence, there are few studies.
This is also true of research using Goffman’s approach to study how people present themselves online (Farr et al., 2012; Shulman, 2022). Such studies look at self-presentation in online dating environments (Ellison et al., 2006), social media (van Dijck, 2013) or the staging of bodies and places in female webcam channels (Senft, 2008). Even in their ethnography of videoconferencing in transnational friendships and families, Miller and Sinanan (2014) refer to Goffman, but less to analyse the synthetic aspects of digital self-presentation, than to remind us that even face-to-face interactions are already mediated. What is missing, then, is an attempt to extend Goffman’s approach to the ways in which self-presentation in video-mediated co-presence is (supposed to be) performed synthetically, that is, simultaneously in a virtual space on the screen and in a physical space in front of the screen.
Bodies and Places in Video Meeting Etiquette
There is a growing body of social science literature on videoconferencing, including the interdisciplinary fields of Human Computer Interaction (HCI) and Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW) (Heath and Luff, 1992; Khan et al., 2014; Luff et al., 2016). This literature covers the use of videoconferencing tools both in work contexts, such as education (Correia et al., 2020), medicine (Fatehi et al., 2014), office meetings (Karl et al., 2022) or research interviews (Raible et al., 2023) as well as in contexts of partnership, friendship and family life (Clarke-Salt, 2017; Greschke, 2022; Licoppe and Morel, 2012, 2014; Longhurst, 2013, 2016; Miller and Sinanan, 2014; Neustaedter et al., 2013).
With regard to etiquettes, routines and tactics of self-presentation in videoconferencing, this literature reveals a noticeable insight: experienced users have been found to have developed nuanced strategies and routines of presenting their body and surroundings in video meetings. For example, they place their bodies in a ‘talking heads position’ (Licoppe and Morel, 2012), use their physical setting in ‘showing sequences’ (Rosenbaun and Licoppe, 2017) and act as rather self-conscious ‘mundane video directors’ (Licoppe and Morel, 2014). Moreover, they use the technical possibility to view oneself like others view them as a resource to manage self-presentation when videoconferencing with friends and family (Miller and Sinanan, 2014). Other studies describe how videoconference tools are arranged within the spatial setting of the household: placing the laptop on a particular item of furniture allows a specific bodily alignment in front of the screen such as sitting, lying, standing (Longhurst, 2013, 2016; Neustaedter et al., 2013) or having a romantic dinner (Clarke-Salt, 2017).
In contrast, videoconferencing in work contexts is characterised by a much greater degree of uncertainty, anxiety and disorientation with regard to rules and routines of self-presentation (Longhurst, 2016), especially since the pandemic-driven expansion of video meetings in the workplace (Hacker et al., 2020; Karl et al., 2022; Raible et al., 2023; Waizenegger et al., 2020). Longhurst (2016), who used qualitative interviews to study videoconferencing in both work and leisure contexts, describes users’ feelings of discomfort and disorientation about appearing on camera in the workplace.
In their analysis of user experiences during the pandemic, Karl et al. (2022: 356) found that many people were unsure about how to present themselves on camera in work-related video conferences. Waizenegger et al. (2020), using qualitative interview data, suggest that working parents and those working from home in particular find the visuality of video meetings intrusive. Hacker et al. (2020) analysed Twitter tweets about the use of videoconferencing during COVID-19. They found that people liked using videoconferencing to socialise with family and friends, but were more afraid of being on camera at work.
I contribute to the literature on videoconferencing in two ways. First, by shedding light on a backstage that has received little attention: training sessions that explain and teach rules and practices of how the body and the place in front of the screen should be used to present oneself in the virtual meeting room of a videoconference. Second, by looking more closely at these rules and practices of synthetic self-presentation, the analysis also opens up new perspectives on issues such as planning or privacy concerns in work-related videoconferencing.
Synthetic Involvement
To analyse how social presence in videoconferences is performed synthetically, I propose the concept
Goffman’s sociological focus on the public performance of involvement and its social functions has not been without criticism (Ostrow, 1996; Psathas, 1977, 1996). For example, Ostrow (1996: 342) argues that Goffman neglects the level of actual spontaneous involvement, ‘our being inserted non-reflectively in the social world’. This criticism, although valid, does not impact the current study as its objective is not to examine how users experience spontaneous involvement during videophonic interactions. The aim is to analyse norms and strategies for expressing involvement in videoconferences as they are explicated in training sessions.
With regard to this research interest, I show how social presence in video meetings is not a pure technological, but a socio-technical matter. Instead of being produced by a technology only, it is indeed a matter of managing one’s self-presentation to others while being in a virtual and a physical situation at the same time. The concept of synthetic involvement addresses this simultaneity as a socio-technical challenge. The involvement to be performed is synthetic because it requires that two levels must be synthesised: the online situation, which is situated within a medium such as a virtual ‘meeting room’ in a videoconference, and the physical situation in front of the screen. I draw on considerations from both practice theory and new materialism to refine the proposed concept. This refinement allows for the analysis of how these two levels might be dis/connected, particularly by capturing the social-technical interplay of bodies, places and media technology.
Theories of practice consider the social as an activity that involves human subjects, their bodies and material-technical artefacts or entities (Hui et al., 2016; Reckwitz, 2002; Schatzki et al., 2001). Reading Goffman’s theory of performance as a theory of practice means viewing performance as a practical activity that encompasses the use of media technology, the body and material artefacts. Similar to an understanding of practice-theoretical concepts in the sociology of technology (Orlikowski, 2007; Suchman et al., 1999), I argue that the use and interplay of these elements is not determined by technical or material functionalities. For example, users of videoconferencing technology do not automatically switch on their camera just because the software allows it. Instead, how bodies, technologies and material things are made to participate in a (digital) performance of social presence is a matter of interpreting implicit social rules as well as technical and material functionalities.
By rejecting an essentialist understanding of technology and materiality, the notion of synthetic involvement is also influenced by neo-materialist theoretical approaches (Coole and Frost, 2010; Ingold, 2007; Kalthoff et al., 2015). These approaches assume that technical and material things, but also human bodies, only develop their properties in specific social contexts, processes and relationships. In terms of the performance of synthetic involvement, I use this idea to show how the body, artefacts and digital technologies acquire specific properties in the context of videoconferencing training courses. Later, I will give an example of how a webcam is not only a device for filming and transmitting, but should also be considered as ‘other people’s eyes’ in this context.
Therefore, the concept of synthetic involvement does not address the interactive management of self-presentation in an online situation, but the socio-technical management of self-presentation in a setting of intersituativity (Ellebrecht and Zur Nieden, 2021; Hirschauer, 2014). As will be shown, the training courses analysed frame the juxtaposition of a virtual and a physical situation as something to be actively managed by participants as they learn to interpret and use videoconferencing tools, their bodies and spaces in new and interconnected ways.
Fieldwork and Data
The fieldwork included three training courses delivered via videoconferencing, which took place in January, February and March 2021. They were offered as part of an in-house training programme for university staff in Austria; two of the courses were also open to non-university staff for a fee. All courses were delivered by trainers specialised in communication and media training. Each course lasted between three and four days, with between eight and 12 participants. A total of 68 hours of training over a period of 10 days was documented by means of participant observation. Moreover, I carried out interviews with three course participants, and two of them kindly provided me with their course notes.
Initially, I attended the first training course as part of my professional development. I therefore started as a covert observer, but immediately revealed my research interest to the participants, when I decided to conduct a sociological study. In doing so, I followed the British Sociological Association’s ethical guidelines to ensure ethical practice throughout the research. Before collecting fieldnotes and interview data, I obtained informed consent from all participants, ensuring strict confidentiality and anonymisation of data. In addition, and despite the face-to-screen nature of the fieldwork, I also tried to make participants repeatedly aware of my ‘ethnographic presence’ (Laube, 2021), for example, by asking for interviews between course sessions. As the study used only anonymised data with informed consent, the author’s university waived institutional ethical review.
Types of Data
The data used in this article consist of ethnographic fieldnotes taken by the author as a participant observer, written and visual training materials provided by the trainers to the course participants and of notes taken by two other course participants. The fieldnotes were produced in a multi-stage process (Emerson et al., 1995; Spradley, 2016): short handwritten notes were taken during the training sessions – ‘jotted notes’ in Spradley’s (2016) sense; immediately after the training session or the following day, these jotted notes were transformed into ‘expanded notes’ (Spradley, 2016: 70) containing as much detail as possible.
Data Analysis
In parallel with the data collection process, the ethnographic data were condensed into analytical memos, which were fed by two phases of coding (Emerson et al., 1995: 150–155): An ‘open coding’ phase led to preliminary analytical codes and categories. Open coding was guided by questions that became increasingly clear to me while doing fieldwork: what rules and strategies for performing social presence in videoconferencing did the trainers focus on? What role did the body and spatial artefacts in front of the screen play in these instructions? The subsequent ‘focused coding’ phase (Emerson et al., 1995: 160–161) identified differences, commonalities and variations within these codes and categories and their connection to analytical ‘key themes’ (Breidenstein et al., 2013: 156–161). One of these key themes was ‘guidelines for performing synthetic involvement’. However, the process of data analysis was not fully determined by theoretical concepts but was a ‘reflexive [. . .] interplay between theory and data’ (Emerson et al., 1995: 167). Thus, the relationship between data collection and concept creation was abductive in at least two ways: first, the research question was explored using existing theoretical concepts as sensitising devices without fully determining the findings. Second, data analysis also led to a further development of Goffman’s theoretical perspective by creating the concept of synthetic involvement.
Methodological Strengths and Limitations
The data collected offers three methodological strengths for answering the research question. First, behavioural training (as well as written behavioural advice) has a documentary function. Various sociologists have used this function, including Elias (2012) in his analysis of historical guides to behaviour, Hochschild (1983) in her ethnographic observation of work-related training in emotional labour, as well as Goffman (1963) who refers to etiquette books to address social rules for expressing involvement. The behavioural trainings studied document social rules for expressing involvement in videoconferencing at a particular point in time: a still ongoing transitional phase in which large parts of society are adopting a communication technology whose constant use is new to many workplaces and for which there are therefore no established routines for the self-presentation that this technology offers.
Second, the behavioural trainings studied have an explicatory function. They clarify which rules and norms, which otherwise remain implicit, should guide interactions in videoconferencing and provide practical instructions on how to fulfil them. A parallel research strategy was used by Hochschild (1983), who studied behavioural training for flight attendants in order to identify the ‘feeling rules’ that apply to this service profession.
Third, the data provide insights into course participants’ reactions to the advice given to them, including resistance, uncertainty and reflection in relation to the recommended rules and instructions. This third strength, which could be described as a reflective function, distinguishes the data used here from etiquette books or video instructions.
As the study follows the methodological principles of qualitative research, it has two limitations: first, it does not aim to be statistically representative. As the research follows the idea of ‘theoretical sampling’ (Strauss and Corbin, 1998), the sample was selected in a circular process of data collection and data analysis phases. This abductive process (see above) made it possible to generate a theoretical concept to explain how bodies and places should be integrated in video-mediated self-presentation according to specialists. Second, the generated concept is linked to a specific social context: Austrian higher education. Although this is only one context, it is very significant with regard to one particular aspect: at the time of the study, there were hardly any well-established social rules for self-presentation in videoconferencing. Prior to the pandemic, 70% of staff in Ireland and 74% of staff in the UK in higher education had never taught in a live online environment (National Forum for the Enhancement of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education, 2020: 4). This figure is likely to be even higher in Austria and Germany, where most universities only started to acquire the necessary equipment when the pandemic broke out (Pausits et al., 2021: 42).
Exercising Synthetic Involvement
The training courses studied aimed to convey a distinct message: social presence in a videoconference is not simply created by switching on a webcam, but by specific socio-technical strategies of what I call synthetic involvement. These strategies were based on the assumption that self-presentation in videoconferencing had to be actively managed by the participants by learning to see media tools and their bodies and places in front of
‘Others People’s Eyes Are Your Camera’: Faking Eye Contact
In the sociology of interaction, eye contact is seen as a central strategy for the communicative production of social situations. To specify the latter, Goffman (1963) used the term ‘focused interaction’. By this he meant interaction situations in which two or more participants visibly gather around a common centre of cognitive and reciprocal attention. Central to this idea is that focused interactions are carried out through the display of socially regulated signs of involvement, including eye contact. Through reciprocal eye contact, individuals show that they are not only physically present, but also mentally and emotionally prepared to engage in a social situation. In short, according to Goffman, mutual eye contact is a means of transforming physical co-presence into social co-presence. 1
Against this background, videoconferencing can be understood as a focused interaction that presents specific obstacles to social presence: because their gaze is mediated by the webcam and video display, participants cannot make direct eye contact by looking into the eyes of another participant on the screen. A trainer described this situation to the participants and suggested a possible solution:
‘Don’t look directly at the faces of the other people on the screen’, the trainer explains. The reason: on the other screens it will look as if you are looking to the right, left or down, giving the impression that you are mentally somewhere else. ‘You have to learn this’, says the trainer: ‘Other people’s eyes are your camera! The most important thing is to look straight into the camera.’ (Fieldnotes, Course 1, January 2021)
From the trainer’s point of view, it is not enough to simply switch on the camera and look at the faces of the others on the screen. What to Ego may be appear ‘eye-to-eye’ (Schütz, 2004: 331) in front of her screen, appears to Alter on her screen as if Ego is not looking Alter directly in the eye, but somewhere else. According to the trainer, a person’s eyes must therefore be redirected in such a way that the impression of direct eye contact is created.
This strategy of ‘faking eye contact’ was made plausible through a series of reinterpretations. The course instructors, all three of whom had several years of professional media experience, drew explicit parallels with camera training in a television studio. Equating the space in front of the screen with a television studio paved the way for three strategies of reinterpretation: first, cognitive strategies of reinterpretation, through which the webcam could be reinterpreted from a technical artefact to the ‘other people’s eyes’. According to the course instructors, this reinterpretation is all the easier when one imagines ‘a real person sitting right behind the camera looking at you’. Second, material strategies of reinterpreting the webcam came into play. By sticking a smiley face on the webcam, it was supposed to catch the gaze more effectively and serve as a reminder that there was a real person at the other end of the camera to smile at. Third, and finally, media strategies for designing the screen display were recommended to make it easier to fake eye contact. For example, in order to avoid giving the impression that we were looking away from others, we were advised to position the video images of the conference participants we wanted to address close to our own webcam.
In all three courses the trainers drew on interpersonal communication research to make faking eye contact seem plausible. Two aspects were emphasised: first, eye contact would improve interpersonal communication and increase personal involvement in the communication situation. Remarkably, this recommendation misinterprets Goffman’s considerations on the social structure of eye contact by promoting the interactional ideal of giving as much eye contact as possible, which is likely to be considered creepy in physical co-presence (Hirschauer, 2005). However, it is in line with current AI technologies that artificially simulate permanent eye contact in videoconferencing without the need to look into the camera. 2 Second, learning to look directly into the webcam was explicitly compared in most of the training sessions to camera training in the TV studio, where newscasters or politicians learn to look directly into the TV camera, often supported by a teleprompter that allows them to read their text without having to take their eyes off the camera lens.
Yet, the latter comparison is misleading. Unlike a teleprompter situation, where there is no synchronous and reciprocal interaction between speaker and audience, videoconferences can indeed be characterised as ‘focused interactions’: in a seminar, a business meeting or even a joint dance training session delivered via videoconference, the participants are expected to gather recognisably around a common centre of cognitive and reciprocal attention. The reciprocity of a shared focus of attention suggests that Ego observes Alter’s gaze, as well as her non-verbal facial expressions and gestures, to recognise whether she is mentally involved in the situation. One participant expressed this during the training:
‘“If I always have to look at the camera”, says a university lecturer, “I won’t be able to see the students’ reactions in the video view. How do I solve this?’ (Fieldnotes, Course 2a, January 2021).
The trainer responded to the objection by suggesting that one should try to glance at the video of others occasionally. But rather than solving the eye contact dilemma mentioned above, the recommendation for faking eye contact creates another dilemma: if you focus entirely on presenting your own involvement by giving as much eye contact as possible, it becomes very difficult to observe whether your interaction partners are actually involved.
‘Your Own Video Is a Mirror’: Self-Monitoring of the Personal Front
While faking eye contact seemed strange and irritating to the vast majority of the training participants, another strategy was already more familiar: the monitoring of one’s own video view. In Goffman’s (1959) terms, this practice involves monitoring the ‘personal front’, that is, the part of the front that people normally carry on and with their bodies. First, the participants were shown what to focus on when self-monitoring their personal front by learning about ‘don’ts’. These were explained by the trainers using screenshots:
‘There are a lot of things you can do wrong when positioning your body in the video view’, the instructor says. To illustrate these ‘don’ts’, he shows us a slide with bad examples. One shows the video view of a young man with his head cut off from the nose down. The second image shows a woman sitting with her back to a window, her face entirely obscured by shadow. (Fieldnotes, Course 2b, February 2021)
In addition to these ‘don’ts’, the training also included a number of ‘do’s’. One participant, who gave me her transcript after the training, noted the following ‘do’s’:
As can be seen from these notes, the trainer aimed to explicate social rules of performing synthetic involvement that were previously implicit to the participants – and at best explicated in the small but select circle of sociological research on videoconferencing. A good example of this is what Licoppe and Morel (2012) refer to as ‘talking heads position’, namely a peculiar way of positioning the head centrally and in the middle of the video view, which has established itself as an unspoken social rule in videoconferencing.
An important part of the training was to raise awareness and refine this unspoken rule. Awareness and refinement of previously rarely considered standards of body positioning in videoconferencing were supported by the introduction of novel terms such as ‘head air’. This term, which the training participants had never heard before, although they had been videoconferencing almost daily for almost a year, was presented to provide them with a simple measure of appearing as a ‘talking head’: the distance between the top of the video screen and one’s own head could then be measured step by step as too much, too little or just the right amount of ‘head air’.
However, the training was not limited to explaining the rules of posture and positioning associated with practically hosting or taking part in videoconferences. Instead, it also promoted the use of certain technical functionalities of current videoconferencing software to learn and monitor compliance with these rules. From a micro-sociological perspective and expanding Goffman’s (1959) concept of the ‘front’, we might speak of training in synthetic front management. In this way, the training framed the technical feature of ‘self-view’, which is activated by default in most videoconferencing software, as a tool to be used for synthetic front management:
The trainer recommends that we actively use the ‘self-view’ to monitor our self-presentation in the videoconference: ‘I use the self-view like a mirror’, he explains. ‘Especially before entering a meeting, but also during the meeting, you can use it to constantly check that you are not unintentionally going out of frame or that your head is not too high.’ (Fieldnotes, Course 3a, February 2021)
The use of a reinterpretation is also striking here: the technical function of ‘self-view’ becomes a ‘mirror’. The very notion of a ‘mirror’ implies the need to continuously self-monitor the personal front, which would not exist without the medium of videoconferencing. The fact that the ‘self-view’ function does not necessarily have to be activated, but can also be deactivated so that participants do not have to constantly look at their self on the screen, is an option that the trainer mentions but does not recommend. This means that using the self-view, and in particular using it as a ‘mirror’, is not compulsory; only the reinterpretation of the technical function as a ‘mirror’ establishes the permanent monitoring of the personal front as normal, as necessary and also as ‘professional’.
According to the trainers, constant self-monitoring does not lead to excessive demands, but to greater confidence during the interaction and more professionalism. This contrasts with psychological studies, which argue that the constant self-monitoring while videoconferencing is a major cause of ‘screen fatigue’ (Bailenson, 2021). These studies, therefore, recommend switching off the self-view in videoconferences. In a theoretical article on videoconferencing, Roth and Laut (2023: 116–117) come to a different conclusion. They argue that constantly watching yourself in a videoconference allows you to see how others see you without having to read their reactions. It can be argued, however, that the constant monitoring of one’s own ‘front’ recommended in the training comes at the expense of both visual and cognitive engagement with interaction partners. There is a danger of literally losing sight of them, a danger that several training participants found problematic.
‘What to Do with My Background?’: Adjusting the Stage Setting
At the beginning of this article, I reported that most participants in the training courses were concerned with one question in particular: how do I design my background? Course participants obviously considered the design of the background of their video view as a highly relevant sign of involvement in video-mediated meetings. They argued that there is a greater need for design in this area because, with people working from home, the background of the video view might show a part of the living space. Significantly, at the beginning of the courses, some participants apologised for using virtual backgrounds, a feature that most videoconferencing tools now offer. The reason for the apology was: ‘My place is not tidy.’ This seemed to be an implicit rule of behaviour expressed by the participants: A background showing the private living space should only be visible in the video view if it has been specially prepared and adapted beforehand.
This rule was indeed confirmed by the trainers. In addition, they evaluated how successfully the participants applied these rules. Therefore, I speak of the synthetic work of ‘stage design’. Using this notion, Goffman (1959) referred to the part of the ‘front’ that is formed by the props and scenery for social interaction. Working on the stage design for videoconferencing is synthetic because the physical location, which in the age of remote working during the pandemic has increasingly become identical to the private living space, has to be designed such that it can serve as an appropriate backdrop for a videoconference at the same time.
Note that the trainers presented the adjustment of the stage setting as a resource for the performance of synthetic involvement in work-related meetings, rather than mere self-presentation. Participants were advised to carefully contemplate which areas of the surrounding space they wanted to make visually accessible, as well as which props to use. Therefore, the reflexive adjustment of the stage setting in video meetings, which has been framed as a notable exception in previous research on videoconferencing (Longhurst, 2016: 2), was considered a central ingredient for ‘professional presence’. As the trainers suggested, virtual backgrounds or soft focus could be used ‘in a pinch’, but they had the disadvantage that distortion effects were likely to occur when the body moved. Also, and more importantly, physical backgrounds would look more ‘real’ and ‘authentic’. This is not to say that this authenticity simply exists. Instead, from the trainer’s point of view, it is the result of a reflection and evaluation process in which videoconference participants have to assess the suitability of their physical environment as a possible video background. The trainers, therefore, advised the participants by inspecting and evaluating the backgrounds visible in their video view:
‘Is that a plant on your bookshelf?’, the trainer asks me. ‘It looks like that green stuff is growing out of your head. I would remove it. Also, those two pictures are hanging very close to your head, which isn’t ideal either. And what are those things next to the plant on the bookshelf? It all looks a bit cluttered.’ We are given the task of rearranging our backgrounds for the next class according to the teacher’s instructions. So, I take down the pictures – two of my son’s drawings – move the houseplant to the edge of the bookshelf so that it is no longer visible in my video view; for the other ‘things’ I look for new places outside the camera angle. After the rearrangement, this corner of the room feels very bare. (Fieldnotes, Course 2b, February 2021)
What can we learn from this fieldnote? First, participants need to be sensitised so that they can assess the suitability of their physical environment to be used as a video-mediated set. The guiding criterion should be that the face and upper body are clearly recognisable and contrast clearly with the background. Therefore, plants, pictures and other domestic objects should not interfere with the set. Second, the participants are also asked to manipulate their physical surroundings such that the video view gives as little indication as possible that this is a space that is normally not only a home office, but also a space for living, sleeping, ironing, storing clothes, cooking and so on. Therefore, the private space has to be subjected to an impression test before it is shown in a videoconference.
The vast majority of the participants were open to learning rules and strategies of synthetic stage design and actively participated in the corresponding assignments. In other words, they wanted to disguise the fact that their PC workstation, for example, was in the middle of a room full of ironed clothes, children’s toys or dirty dishes – in any case, in a physical place where there were not only workstations. As can be seen, the training courses propose a new competence, which can be described as ‘tidying up’ in the age of digital work. Overall, the aim of this competence is to reflect on and evaluate which material objects and environments from the private sphere are suitable for the performance of involvement in a video-mediated event in the workplace. From the trainer’s point of view, this competence requires the ability to reflect on and evaluate the physical situation in front of the webcam according to dramaturgical aspects.
Conclusion
In this article, I argue that the concept of
The analysis acknowledges that digital media now typically create interactions in which participants find themselves in both virtual and physical situations simultaneously. In doing so, it contributes to overcome the misleading dichotomy between offline and online interaction by viewing the simultaneity of on- and offline situations as a central performative problem for participants in digital interactions. Thus, the notion of synthetic involvement draws our attention to how digital self-presentation incorporates the materiality of bodies and places in novel ways, for example in the constant self-monitoring of one’s own physical appearance.
As a theoretical contribution, I suggest that the concept of synthetic involvement provides a theoretical tool that expands the phenomenological focus on digital co-presence, which concentrates on interpretive and felt dimensions. Rather, the concept shows how digital co-presence is also a matter of performances that link videoconferencing tools, bodies and spaces on screen and in front of the screen in hybrid and interconnected ways. Furthermore, the visual enactment of bodies and places that is being described here as synthetic involvement can be considered a normative practice in line with Goffman’s theatre metaphor.
Against this background, the concept of synthetic involvement also provides a lens to study the socio-technical management of self-presentation in video meetings (and other interactions mediated by digital media) in empirical ways. Since especially work-related settings of videoconferencing are characterised by uncertainty, anxiety and disorientation with regard to norms and etiquettes of enacting bodies and places, it opens up new perspectives on issues such as planning or privacy concerns in (work-related) videoconferencing. It shows how videoconferencing, especially in new areas of use, keeps participants busy not only during online meetings, but also before and after, as they prepare and reflect on how to present themselves.
The ethnographic findings presented in this article focus on rules and strategies of synthetic involvement in work-related video meetings in the midst of the pandemic. Their primary aspect is a commitment to visualisation, a ‘mandate of visibility’ (Longhurst, 2016: 123). However, the findings cannot determine whether or how these norms of synthetic involvement, which emphasise visual presence, are currently being enforced, experienced and performed in the workplace. Furthermore, it is also unclear which non-visual norms and strategies of synthetic involvement in videoconferencing are currently considered legitimate in different areas of work and social life. These issues require further research, both in training programmes and in the everyday use of videoconferencing tools.
Footnotes
Funding
ORCID iD
