The influence of Emoji on Communication using Social Media-

A Quantitative Study among College Students of Mysuru

 

Swathi Suresh*

Baccalaureate, Visual Media,Amrita School of Arts and Science, Mysuru Campus,Amrita VishwaVidhyaPeetham, Amrita University

*Corresponding Author Email: swathisuresh1995@gmail.com

 

ABSTRACT:

The rise of internet gave birth to a method of communication we recognize emoticons then evolved to Emoji presently. The emoji have become the shortest version of expressing messages non-verbally. Sometimes people even judge the attitude of others to the kind of emoji’s they use. This has become a modern trend in communication. The purpose of this research is to study the influence of Emoji on communication language. The objective of the study the awareness, perception and the usage pattern of Emoji in various communication platforms like E-mails, Facebook, WhatsApp, twitter and Instagram by youth. The preference given to Emoji over the text communication is increasing. The study also brings awareness among people about the importance and the misinterpretations happening because of Emoji among youth. The methodology proposed in this study is Quantitative method through survey technique and the findings would be graphically represented. The survey would be conducted among 200 students between the age group of 18-23 at Mysore. The overall approach of this study is to understand the impact of emoticons on students in their daily life. The researchers mean to measure the awareness, perception, and recall-ability and usage pattern of emoticons by the students on E-mails, Facebook, WhatsApp, twitter and Instagram etc.  Excessive usage of Emoji has turned it into a form of stickers, badges, key chains, pillows, bags etc. The final phase includes the need to understand how the recipients understand the message and to be aware that it may differ from the intended meaning. Emoji reduce the written form of communication and also have certain subtle nuances. The research paper would suggest the appropriate use of emoji effectively in the communication resolving its negative impact.

 

KEYWORDS: Emoji, Stickers, visuals/ images on Social media.

 

 


INTRODUCTION:

Effective Communication is a very mandatory element of our life. When we look back to history, communication was limited to letter, oral, symbols, art etc. But today because of the internet, communication has transformed to be the most powerful medium. Distance is not a factor, messages are transmitted in a fraction of seconds.

 

Time is moving in such a pace that every day you see a new innovation in the technology and Social media has brought such a change in the nature of communication. The growth in communication began from letters, calls, emails, text messages and now evolved to its shortest and latest form of emoji. Emojiare influencing the lives of people and the way they communicate with others. They represent every day aspects of life due to this it has brought unexpected popularity. And results show that the level of interaction is incredibly high by the usage of emoticons. Emojilightened the mood and relaxes your mind. Social media applications are spending lot of money on emoji and tactics to make them more attractive for the users. Emoji instantly deliver the emotion we want to express to the other person .Messages need not be typed long instead an Emoji can say much more .This is leading to a decline in the usage of words and language. This tends to make people lazy to read and they have started to use the shortest form of texting, just by one click. They are being used in such a larger extent that the users mind automatically functions to insert an Emoji after every text. This is why people find it handier while conversing on social media. Study even says that Emoji can make you appear jovial in social media, it can make you popular and it can give you more happiness on a daily basis. It has transformed the psychology of the users and they correlate the Emoji with real life happiness. It personalizes the content and it resonates with almost all kinds of people. These animated symbols add colour and effectiveness to otherwise simple texts. They have set a mark in culture, language and also in materialistic things in our life. The Emoji have taken the form of key chains, bags, badges etc. They have occupied their place even in the corporate world. Many companies use Emoji as a marketing element because customers find the Emoji attractive and convincing. This can give them more fame and they can broaden their reach because people among all age groups find Emoji very amiable. They are so prominent in the present millennial generation that the future of Emoji in the communication industry might shoot up substantially.

 

But at times there are misinterpretations caused because of wrong use of Emoji. The meaning of some Emoji and the intention of the user is not understood which causes issues among people. And the expectation of particular Emoji at situations has led to negative psychological changes among the youth. Sometimes people also find some emoticons irritating. Interpretation issue aside, the study of the usage pattern of these Emoji among teenagers and the youth is very interesting. And in this paper the researcher studies the impact of Emoji among different social media applications .The research will determine perception of the youth, the way they interpret the Emoji. It will give a fruitful outcome of the value of Emojiin communication pattern and learn the human behaviour towards Emoji. There is a gradual increase in the usage of Emoji in every field and their usage is implemented even in corporate and professional communication. The study will determine how Emoji have emerged to be the fastest growing communication language, its relevance on the youth and their usage pattern of various Emoji on social media.

 

REVIEW OF LITERATURE:

Tae WoongPark, Si-Jung Kim, Gene Lee:

The study was conducted to understand the impact of emoji in instant messaging and to examine the results of the frequency and variety of emoji’s used among the people and how it is affecting the relationship between the users. The research also gives suggestions to the audience of how to improve the understanding of emoticon usage and the researchers predict the future of emoticons in instant messaging on smartphones and social media. The methodology used is data analysis and the author has analysed the pros and cons of the computer based communication. The findings of the study show the richness of instant messaging using emoticons and show that the instant messaging technique has replaced the verbal communication to a larger extent. Without them communication is losing its value among social media users. And it even showed that people are very much attracted to the animated emoticons. A very little is known about the specifically about the study of emoticons so the author broadens this interesting topic and studies it among the people and their perception towards it.From this study the researchers can inculcate the relevance of these Emoji in smartphones and in instant messaging. It can benefit us by the various suggestions given by the authors to use the emoticons in the most effective way and the better methods to use the Emoji in the simplest manner so that it can be easily understood.

 

Petra Kralj Novak, Jasmina Smailovic, Borut Sluban, Igor Mozetic:

This study focuses on another aspect-sentiment of Emoji. And the author gives us a definite section i.e. how they are being used in Twitter. It shows how the modern communication has evolved by the usage of Emoji and how the users are targeted by social media. The objective of the study is how Emoji are used as graphical symbols as a shorthand to express concepts and ideas. And the researcher even studies the content of the Emoji and their real meaning. The study also suggests the sentiment analysis of emoticon usage to draw interesting results. Emoji are very much used in twitter and after every tweet an emoji is inserted. The methodology used is again data analysis and also graphical method determining sentiment distribution to analyse the key properties of emoticons. Detailed maps showing the frequency of the kind of Emoji used by people at situations basically the overall human perception about different emoticons. Next the study examines the tweets with and without Emoji and how far it’s influencing the public. And through the tests we can learn that there are two populations having equal sentiment scores .We can learn that emoticons are positive and are emotionally loaded. There is an overall explanation about Emojientiment Lexicon and its ranking. An analysis of the properties of Emoji in depth with conclusions.And the researchers can deduce some interesting facts of Emoji how they are being used in the Social Media giant twitter, including the tweets in 13 languages. The sentiment factor of Emoji and criticism of controversial Emoji and monitoring the role of emoji as a modifier and elaborator this can benefit in studying of influence of emoticons on the general public.

 

Hannah Miller:

Emoji are positive but they can also cause miscommunication and this causes problems on not understanding the emotion delivered. Problems could be caused by the misinterpretation of the meaning of Emoji. Many times people link their sentiments with the Emoji which can turn small problems to big issues. The main goal of this paper to investigate if the variety of Emoji can cause miscommunication. And also to study how people interpret Emoji and the fundamental shift of text messaging to emoticons. We can determine the role of Emoji in human communication, how mandatory they have become that excess use of these are causing issues at certain situation. A quantitative study where a survey among youngsters about their perception, with around 5 platform presenting and the participants were asked the emotional meaning and the sentiment of each render of the Emoji in a scale format, and with a number of graphs and maps the results where charted. And in many of the cases it was found that Emoji can cause failure of conversing. It was found that many people interpret the same emoji in different ways. There were some people who thought Emoji were very positive but a few found them irritating and useless. From this study a researcher can go in depth about Emoji, the small complications occurring because of Emoji and how to solve them. The researchers can get a clear idea and clarification about the sentiments and rendering of Emoji .But leaving the negative part aside, you get awareness about building the technology in languages using Emoji for the future generations.

 

The above study gives us an overview of the emoticon usage mainly in online communication and for useful purposes in this digital age. The research also recommends he online instructors and online tutors a strategy to improve communication and also to build relations and communities. The research says if used efficiently emoticons can be used as an efficient tool for education for the future generation.

 

Arianne Skovhholt, Anette Gronning, Anne Kankaanranta:

Computer based communication presents Emoji as visual representations of the emotion of the writers. Therefore emoticons are not only used to depict the emotions but also in order to enhance the effect of the information to be delivered. They help to maintain the interpersonal relations while the interactions between the users. The main objective of this study is to see how Emoji have entered the workplace and in the e-mails. To identify the authentic functions of emoticons and how now even employees use it as effective tool of communication. As the emotional state of the person is clearly understood by the users and how they are being used to compensate for the lack of non-verbal communication aspects. The research is proposed in order to analyse or study the concepts in order to identify what type of speech for what type of Emoji for what kind of official message. Research on the use of Emoji in e-mail over the years has brought issues regarding their functions as indicators of the state of the communicator. The method used is the quantitative method where the data consisted of a total of 1606 e-mail messages which were collected from three different companies and a lot more data especially emails where collected from various sources which gave valid input to the researchers, even speech acts of various emoticons were examined. The results of the study where very interesting and all where well organized and presented in a systematic table format. And the outcome shows how emoticons mark a positive attitude and how they act as softeners in communication. And they play the role of strengthens in the e-mail communication and the visible practice of using Emoji in e-mail correspondence in the companies analysed.The author gives a systematic review of the communicative functions of Emoji and their multifunctional features. BeforeEmoji were only used in messaging but now even in e-mails and official conversations, this research clearly proves tithe researchers have suggested the people to fulfil their communicative needs by using emoticons and use effectively in every medium including e-mails, online media and all platforms where communication is possible non-verbally.

 

Nikola Ljubesic, Darja Fiser:

Emoji are spreading in a swift manner and its creating a phenomenon in a global perspective. Emoji was actually the most used word in 2015 and was awarded “The word of the year”, for this nomination Oxford University had partnered with Swift Key company .This shows how prominent Emoji are in the present world. The main idea of this paper deals with cluster analysis of emoji distribution and their performance analysis. And the analysis is mainly focussed on the usage of Emoji on twitter. The messages with and without Emoji were analysed and the differences between the emoji-using and emoji –abstaining users regarding their number of tweets. The distribution shows that in more than half of the tweets containing Emoji are very much popular in social media and the differences in the popularity of Emoji on twitter around the world in different countries are neutralized in the study. And the emoji density used in every country is analysed.The method used for the data collection and analysis is data analysis. In this type of analysis the popularity of a single emoji in each country is analysed and cluster results were determined and compared .And from the study we could get the worldwide spatial study of emoji usage and the popularity of the Emoji on twitter were studied. The study also presented the understanding how Emoji are being used in the natural language syntax.From this study we study the usage and impact of Emoji in a global perspective .The results show that Emoji in twitter are most popular in South-Eastern Asia and South America, while in USA and Japan the usage frequency is much lower. And the Emoji also depict the living conditions, the lifestyle and the culture of different groups of people around the world.

 

Nusrat Zareen, Nosheen Karim, Umar Ali Khan:

Emoji are obviously to express emotions but now they are also to determine concepts and ideas. TheEmoji have the potential to manipulate emotional aspects of the consumer and can also be a cause of stress and psychological trauma. The main aim of the research is to assess the potential psycho-emotional impact of digital Emoji on instant messaging application users. And the study was also conducted to survey the users of e-messaging on social media and the emotional inclination of the users towards these communication tools used on Social media. The psychological dependence of the users towards this quick and easy message transfer by graphics was clearly shown in the results. The method used was quantitative where a questionnaire survey to study the impact was implemented among 97 people in Rawalpindi. Percentage responses were compared, calculated and accurate results were deduced. Around 90 percent of the people found emoji communication more meaningful. Most of the assessed participants were independent of age, gender influence and time spent on social media. Emoji effectiveness for emotion expression, mood swings and kind of messages sent revealed that it was depended on the age and gender factor. And the study recommends a more careful usage of Emoji so that it brings a smooth communication between users. Humans are prone to emotions and the fragile minds can get affected by some negative Emoji or representations especially on social media. So the author suggests a more cautious usage of Emoji.

 

From the research we can study that the impact of Emoji is high and these Emoji need to be softened for spreading positive vibes among people and not to distress them. TheEmoji can actually adverse the emotional and psychological effects on the users. Emoji are used along with text but their graphical meanings is left to the recipients how they take it, they are just graphical elaborations we needn’t take these Emoji in a sentimental manner, this what the authors suggest.

 

METHODOLOGY:

The methodology proposed in this study is Quantitative method through survey technique and the findings would be graphically represented. The survey would be conducted among 200 students between the age group of 18-23 at Mysore.

 

Most Used Social Media Application:

It is observed from the graphical representation that WhatsApp is the most used social media application followed by Instagram followed by Face book when surveyed among 200 students. 75.1% of people preferWhatsApp to use for their daily communication.

 

Reason for Using Emoji:

The above graph provides the information that the Emoji are mainly used to express their emotions while communicating with others. It is only 10.3% of people use emoticons to make conversation more personal, 11.3% of people use emoticons to shorten the message and very less people use Emoji for time pass. By this it is shown that most of the people are expressing their emotions though Emoji.

 

Emoji in Social Media:

From the above chart, we can see that 93.4% of people like to use Emoji in social media. Less than 10% of people do not like to use Emoji in social media. Emoji in social media have become a new trend and it is creating a kind of revolution in the communication process.  It is very crystal clear from the chart that Emoji in social media are necessarywhere in it attracts the audiences also especially youngsters.

 

RESULTS:

From the above graphical representation, it is understood that there is a good knowledge about emoticons among youngsters. It is very interesting to know that WhatsApp is the most used social media application wherein they found Emoji of Whatsapp most attractive but they feel that it is not professional to use them for official conversations in Whatsapp.It’s astonishing to know that even though the youth use Emoji for conveying their emotions they still prefer text along with the emoji to add more value to their communication on social media. We can learn that majority of the respondents prefer using Emoji only while expressing the emotions. The reason for using Emoji excessively is because they find Emoji to be the shortest form of conveying the message. People find Emoji appealing because they feel it adds more grandeur to social media. And most of the youngsters send emoticons depending on their instant reaction and some even use particular Emoji depending on their mood, basically it’s their state of mind which decides their response to others. The outcome shows that the emoji addict youngsters are comparatively less to the non addicts. In the social media driven society Emoji are playing vital role because it helps them portray emotions like a face to face talk. The study says that emoticons are commonly used to express thoughts and feelings mostly with friends followed by family. It is important to infer from the research that the participants understand the messages through the Emoji .Being such a relevant communication tool, theEmoji on the other side has also created misunderstanding between people due to the wrong usage of Emojiat situations. The researcher also deduces the fact that few Emoji are not only entertaining but sometimes irritating too. On the contrary the participants have also agreed that Emoji do not bother those Emoji and based on the usage of Emoji one can never predict the character of a person. The survey even proved that Emoji actually add humour to the messages so the youngsters have chosen the “Emoji with the tears of joy” as the most used emoji in their conversations. And an interesting fact is that this emoji was declared as the “Word of year 2015” by the Oxford Dictionary(Wikipedia).It’s unfortunate to know that the respondents do not actually know the meaning of emoji’s but they only have an idea about the Emoji they frequently use. These are the major findings proven by the researchers from the survey and it gives an overview about the impact of Emoji on youth.

 

CONCLUSION:

The paper provides us with the knowledge of the influence of Emoji on the youth and how it has transformed communication to its shortest form. Gradually the Emoji has turned into a new language and now ruling the minds of the users of social media. In the present situation, the perception of the people is that they are positive, happy and comfortable with the usage of the Emoji. Younger generation is so much habituated that it has become an integral part of their communication. The Emoji are ruling social media because of their attractive nature. In this era of visual communication, Emoji are bridging the gap between the text and emotions. The researchers suggest that it’s better to know the proper meaning of the Emoji in order to avoid the misinterpretation. By doing so, there would be a better impact of Emoji as a communication device. With of rise of technology and social media people have received the miniature form of communication, which has stunted their knowledge towards language, word, letters etc. Hence they prefer everything in a visual form. The researchers have successfully achieved their objective of the study the awareness, perception and the usage pattern of Emoji in various communication platforms. The study gives  the appropriate usage ratio of Emoji presently in a city Mysore and the scope of the study predicts that the usage of Emoji has created a revolution in the field of communication and the future will see a different version of communicating through social media or any other platform with less usage of language and more of Emoji, the study predicts that this is just a beginning if the use of Emoji grow in this pace this can emerge to be a powerful communication tool in its shortest and user-friendly form.

 

 

 

 

REFERENCES:

1.     A Study of Emoji use in instant messaging from smart phone by Tae Woong Park, Si-Jung Kim, Gene Lee

2.     Sentiment of Emoji by Petra Kralj Novak, JasminaSmailovic, BorutSluban, gorMozetic

3.     Investigating the potential for miscommunication using emoji by Hannah Miller

4.     Sarcasm and Emoji: Comprehension and emotional impact By Ruth Filik, Alexandra Turcan and Amelia Turner

5.     The Impact of Emoji on affect interpretation in Instant Messaging by Amy Ip

6.     What sunshine is to flowers: A literature review on the usage of emoticons to support online learning by Joannna C.Dunlap, Devshika Bose, PatrickR. Lowenthal, Cindy.S.York, Micheal Atkinson, Jim Murtagh

7.     The communicative functions of Emoji in workplace e-mails by Karianne Skovhholt, Anette Gronning, Anne Kankaanranta

8.     The effect of Emoji in simplex and complex task oriented communication: An Empirical study of instant messaging by TainyiLuor, Ling-ling Wu, Hsi-PengLu, Yu-Hui-Tao

9.     A global analysis of emoji usage by Nikola Ljubesic, DarjaFiser

10.   Psycho emotional impact of Social media Emoji by NusratZareen, NosheenKarim, Umar Ali Khan

11.   www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com

12.   www.wikipedia.com

13.   www.symbols-n-emoticons.com/p/facebook-emoticons-list.html

14.   https://www.theguardian.com/.../difference-between-emoji-and-emoticons-explained

15.   www.link.springer.com

16.   Mobile.abc.net.au

17.   www.cnbc.com

 

 

 

Received on 24.10.2017       Modified on 18.12.2017

Accepted on 10.02.2018      ©AandV Publications All right reserved

Res.  J. Humanities and Social Sciences. 2018; 9(1): 158-162.

DOI: 10.5958/2321-5828.2018.00028.1