Using hand gestures can improve your experience of video calls

Using simple hand gestures during video calls seems to improve people's experience of such interactions. Paul Hills at University College London (UCL) came up with a set of gestures after many video calls during covid-19 lockdowns. "It was born out of my frustration with [online] meetings," says Hills – who also works as a management consultant – during a video call with New Scientist in which he uses the hand actions. In online meetings, he began informally testing a range of gestures, including ones borrowed from his work as a volunteer lifeguard and as a mentor to an addiction support group. Initial positive feedback prompted him to team up with Daniel Richardson at UCL and other colleagues to more formally test the signals.