During the pandemic, when Zoom became the defacto way for many of us to communicate, the backgrounds provided a glimpse into people’s lives. Research from Durham University shows that different backgrounds affect how we’re perceived by others.

Previous research has shown that the first impression we make on others can be pretty important. It can affect things like how someone might judge us in a court case or whether someone wants to date us.

Background choices

In recent times, more of our first meetings with others happen online through video calls. When we’re on video calls, we can choose what’s behind us, like a nice room or a funny picture. However, not much research has looked at how this choice affects what people think of us.

So, the researchers got 167 adults to look at pictures that looked like they were taken during video calls. Each picture showed a person’s face, either smiling or with a normal expression, with different backgrounds like a living room, a blurry living room, some houseplants, a bookshelf, a blank wall, or a funny picture of a walrus on an iceberg. Then, the people looking at these pictures had to say how competent and trustworthy they thought each person looked.

What they found was that people thought faces with houseplants or bookshelves behind them were more trustworthy and competent. Faces with living rooms or funny pictures behind them were seen as less competent and trustworthy.

Building trust

People also tended to think that smiling faces looked more trustworthy and competent than neutral faces. Female faces were generally seen as more trustworthy and competent. However, for female faces, having a living room background didn’t make them seem less trustworthy, unlike male faces.

Now, more research needs to be done to make sure these findings hold true in different situations, especially because the pictures used in this study mostly had white people. But the takeaway here is that if you want to make a good impression on video calls, especially if you’re a man, it might help to smile and have a background with houseplants or a bookshelf.

“This research shows how our Zoom backgrounds can affect the first impressions we make,” the authors conclude. “If you want to come across as trustworthy and competent there are some backgrounds you should use and some you should definitely avoid.”