Ideas on mute? Study: Remote meetings dampen brainstorming

By SETH BORENSTEIN
AP Science Writer

A new study says if you want to brainstorm during a meeting, it works better in person than over remote video conferencing. Wednesday’s study in the journal Nature looks at pairs of engineers who tried to brainstorm ideas. In-person meetings generated 17% more ideas on average — and better ones at that. Researchers suggest that on video calls people stared at the other person instead of letting their eyes and minds wander, which dampens creativity. In real life, they tend to look around more because staring can be rude.