Positive Emoticons Research Articles

Color perception and its relation to dental anxiety in children.

One of the major causes of dental anxiety in children is their first impression of the dental environment. Even minor details, such as the choice of color in a dental setting and the color of dental equipment, can positively influence a child's behavior. The aim of the study was to assess the relationship between the emotions in children and color combinations in a pediatric setting. The study involved 200 children (99 boys and 101 girls) aged between 6 and 12 years who visited the dental clinics at the College of Dentistry, Jazan University, for the first time between November 2017 and January 2018. The participants were divided into 2 groups based on age. The younger children group included participants aged from 6 to 9 years, while the older children group included participants aged from 10 to 12 years. Anxiety levels were recorded using the Modified Dental Anxiety Scale. Colored pencils and images of emoticons were provided to all children, who were instructed to color the negative and positive emoticons with their preferred colors. The analysis of anxiety levels among children in both groups revealed statistically significant differences across sexes in the younger age group, with girls being more anxious than boys (p = 0.003). Additionally, a statistically significant difference was observed in the choice of colors by children of both sexes in 2 age groups (p = 0.001). Most children were inclined towards bright colors and used them to express their emotions. The incorporation of colors in a dental setting could invoke positive emotions in children. Hence, the use of colors in the workplace has the potential to ease anxiety.

People follow emotion display rules when choosing emoticons on social media

ABSTRACT This study examined whether people use emoticons on Facebook in the same way they display emotions via facial expressions in face-to-face interaction. In an online experimental study (N = 124), participants completed the “Emoticon Display Rules on Facebook” (EDRF) scale adapted from the Display Rule Assessment Inventory (DRAI). People tend to use more positive emoticons in public settings, and more negative ones in private settings. They also use more and more intense emoticons with close friends and acquaintances than strangers. This study provides further support for the positivity bias on Facebook and shows that emoticons are simply used to express emotions in the same ways as in face-to-face interactions.

Exploring the Use of Austin’s Theory of Illocutionary Acts in Different Social Interactions

This paper reviews how Austin’s illocutionary act theory is used in face-to-face communication and online communication. In the aspect of face-to-face interaction, this paper places attention on the use of polite language and interaction in ESL (English as a second language) classrooms. In terms of online interaction, this paper explored interaction on Facebook and the use of memes, emoticons, emojis and stickers. After reviewing several research, this paper concluded that when talking face-to-face, the level of formality, gender, and cultural background affects people’s polite language. In ESL classrooms, the power, distance and rate of imposition affect teachers’ and students’ choice of language. However, the result of speech acts preference on Facebook is conflict. Previous research pointed out that memes can be categorized as communicative speech acts. Evidence shows that positive emoticons are preferred, which can improve friendships and vice versa. The review of literature contributes to further studies on the illocutionary act analysis of ESL classrooms in China and the communicative effectiveness of memes on the receivers.

Image Framing, Emoticons, and Sharing Intention for Health-Related Posts on Facebook.

In response to calls for greater integration of research on the effects of visual images in the emotional and cognitive processing of health-related posts on Facebook, this study examined the questions of how gain-and-loss framed images, the valence of emoticon responses, and level of personal relevance of health topics contribute toward intentional engagement (e.g., sharing the posts) on Facebook. This study conducted a 2 (visual framing: gain vs. loss) × 2 (personal relevance of health topic: high vs. low) × 2 (emoticon valence: positive vs. negative) mixed-factorial experiment. A total of 187 college students were recruited to assess the impact of visual framing, personal relevance, and emoticon valence on sharing intention. Results showed that negative emoticons led to a higher intention to share health news posts than positive emoticons. Moreover, two parallel mediation models showed that (a) gain-framed images with high-relevance topics positively predicted perceived susceptibility but negatively predicted perceived severity that both positively impacted sharing intention; (b) loss-framed images with low-relevance topics positively predicted perceived severity but negatively predicted perceived susceptibility that both positively impacted the sharing intention. The implications regarding the contribution to the literature of visual framing and emotion on social media engagement and health communication are discussed.

The Power of Emojis: The Impact of a Leader’s Use of Positive Emoticons on Employee Creativity

Past literature on emoticons has offered limited insights on the effect of using emoticons in organizational settings, especially in the context of leader-employee relationships. The current research examines how a leader’s use of positive emoticons influences employees’ perception of being objectified, a phenomenon frequently experienced in workplaces, as well as their creative performance. We find that a leader’s use of positive emoticons decreases employees’ perception of being objectified, which in turn enhances their creativity. We further find that this impact of a leader’s use of positive emoticons on employees’ creativity is stronger when employees have a higher level of interpersonal orientation. Theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed.

Smile or pity? Examine the impact of emoticon valence on customer satisfaction and purchase intention

Emoticons are pictorial/textual depictions of facial expressions used in marketing communications. Little is known about how customers interpret positive or negative emoticons used by customer service employees in service failure contexts. We investigate the impact of emoticon type on customer satisfaction and re-purchasing intention, and examine the sequential mediating role of perceived sincerity and willingness to forgive. Results show that the use of a negative emoticon in a response leads to a higher level of customer satisfaction and re-purchasing intention than responses with a positive emoticon. We further demonstrate that customers perceive that the presence of a negative emoticon in a response is more sincere and generates a higher level of forgiveness than those responses that use positive emoticons, but only when the communal relationship is salient in the customer’s mind. Our findings offer important theoretical and practical implications in service failure contexts.

Helpful or harmful? A double-edged sword of emoticons in online review helpfulness

Emoticons are graphic demonstrations of facial expressions. They have become a common and easy-to-use tool for online users to express ideas or feelings. Earlier research highlights the importance of emoticons in computer-mediated communications. However, limited attention has been given to the use of emoticons in online reviews. Using the Cognitive Tuning Theory as the backbone, we attempt to examine how emoticons in online reviews influence review helpfulness. One lab experiment with restaurants as the context and one empirical study with data of 4870 hotel reviews from Facebook business pages were conducted. The hypotheses were assessed via multilevel regression analysis using R programming language. Results indicate that positive emoticons enhance review helpfulness when the review is narrative-based and negative emoticons increase review helpfulness when the review is list-based. Processing fluency serves as the underlying mechanism. We discuss theoretical and practical implications.

What kind of emotions do emoticons communicate?

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to study the nature and concept of emoticons/emojis. Instead of taking for granted that these user-generated formats are necessarily emotional, we empirically assessed in what extent are they and the specificity of each one. Drawing on congruent mood state, valence core and emotion appraisal theories we expected a compatible statistical association between positive/negative/neutral emotional valence expressions and emoticons of similar valence. The positive emoticons were consistently associated with positive valence posts. Added to that analysis, 21 emotional categories were identified in posts and correlated with eight emoticons. Design/methodology/approach Two studies were used to address this question. The first study defined emoticon concept and interpreted their meaning highlighting their communication goals and anticipated effects. The link between emojis and emoticons was also obtained. Some emoticons types present more ambiguity than others. In the second study, three years of real and private (Facebook) posts from 82 adolescents were content analyzed and coded. Findings Only the neutral emoticons always matched neutral emotional categories found in the written interaction. Although the emoticon valence and emotional category congruence pattern was the rule, we also detected a combination of different valence emoticons types and emotion categories valence expressions. Apparently the connection between emoticon and emotion are not so obviously straightforward as the literature used to assume. The created objects designed to communicate emotions (emoticons) have their specific corresponding logic with the emotional tone of the message. Originality/value Theoretically, we discussed the emotional content of emoticons/emojis. Although this king of signals have an Asian origin and later borrowed from the western countries, their ambiguity and differing specificity have never been analyzed.

Leveraging a luxury fashion brand through social media

This research aims to understand how the interactions across several social networks influence the visibility of a luxury brand's most relevant social network which acts as a showcase (Instagram).A data mining approach is proposed for modeling the number of likes on Instagram using 365 posts published in the luxury brand's different social networks between 2015 and 2016. Fifteen features related with the brand's social networks, product characteristics and visibility in external media were prepared and used to feed a support vector machine model which achieved an adequate performance (mean absolute percentage error of 27%). A sensitivity analysis was applied to reveal how each of the fifteen features influenced the Instagram likes. The findings unveiled interactions on the remaining networks hold an influence on Instagram likes, particularly Facebook, with the number of video views, the positive emoticons, and the number of comments and shares explaining around 40% of the model.

Mood Detection in Ambiguous Messages: The Interaction Between Text and Emoticons.

Face-to-face communication has several sources of contextual information that enables language comprehension. This information is used, for instance, to perceive mood of interlocutors, clarifying ambiguous messages. However, these contextual cues are absent in text-based communication. Emoticons have been proposed as cues used to stress the emotional intentions on this channel of communication. Most studies have suggested that their role is to contribute to a more accurate perception of emotions. Nevertheless, it is not clear if their influence on disambiguation is independent of their emotional valence and its interaction with text message valence. In the present study, we designed an emotional congruence paradigm, where participants read a set of messages composed by a positive or negative emotional situation sentence followed by a positive or negative emoticon. Participants were instructed to indicate if the sender was in a good or bad mood. With the aim of analyzing the disambiguation process and observing if the role of the emoticons in disambiguation is different according their valence, we measure the rate of responses of perceived mood and the reaction times (RTs) for each condition. Our results showed that the perceived mood in ambiguous messages tends to be more negative regardless of emotion valence. Nonetheless, we observed that this tendency was not the same for positive and negative emoticons. Specifically, negative mood perception was higher for incongruent positive emoticons. On the other hand, RTs for positive emoticons were faster than for the negative ones. Responses for incongruent messages were slower than for the congruent ones. However, the incongruent condition showed different RTs depending on the emoticons’ valence. In the incongruent condition, responses for negative emoticons was the slowest. Results are discussed taking into account previous observations about the potential role of emoticons in mood perception and cognitive processing. We concluded that the role of emoticons in disambiguation and mood perception is due to the interaction of emoticon valence with the entire message.

커뮤니케이션을 위한 모바일 이모티콘의 긍정적 사용행태연구: 남녀대학생을 중심으로

The purpose of this study was to compare college students' emoticon use for positive behavior and to analyze the impact of the factors. This study is consisted of 66 questions based on Social demographic characteristics, personality characteristics factors and both scales of emotional expression. The operational test was administered to 340 college students. In an effort to calibrate emoticon use of positive behavior, the results displayed significance differences depending on the gender and grade of the students. Women used more emoticons than men, and freshman used more emoticons than any other year of students. Women used more emoticons such as texts, images, and flash more than men. Students in their freshman year were shown to use more emoticons than students in other grade levels. Emotional expression was strongly related man with personality traits of integrity. Personality traits of sensitivity, openness, intimacy, and sincerity had a significant influence on the emotional expression. An emoticon is, therefore, be a useful tool to express their emotions. Male and female students with higher levels of congeniality had expressed more emotions that were self-defence ambivalent and concerned-relation ambivalent. However, in the case of the female students, those with higher levels of self-defence ambivalent emotional expressiveness had a lower usage of positive emoticons, while male students with higher levels of self-defence emotional expressiveness used more positive emoticons. Higher levels of congeniality among groups that use mobile emoticons with their parents, whether the frequency of use was high or low, were associated with higher levels of self-defence ambivalence and concerned-relation ambivalence. Those with higher levels of sincerity had low levels of self-defence ambivalence and concerned-relation ambivalence, and those with higher levels of concerned-relation ambivalence had higher levels of positive emoticon usage.

The effect of emoticons in simplex and complex task-oriented communication: An empirical study of instant messaging

Many studies have shed light on general computer-mediated communication, instant messaging (IM), and emotion or emoticons, but little is known specifically about the impacts of emoticons in task-oriented IM communication in the workplace. Therefore, the current study addresses this issue by conducting an exploratory experiment to (1) categorize workplace IM messages into coherent groups, (2) identify the most commonly used emoticons (emblems) for expressing positive, negative, and neutral emotions in the case company, (3) test the differences in the emotional effects of the received text messages with and without emoticons on the reader/s, and (4) examine the intention to use emoticons in IM in the workplace. The results showed that (1) negative emoticons could cause a negative effect in both simplex and complex task-oriented communication, (2) positive emoticons only created a positive effect in complex communication and for female employees in simplex communication, and (3) there is no significant difference between task-oriented messages with or without neutral emoticon. Furthermore, the intention of using emoticons was not statistically significant in terms of gender, but it has a higher tendency on female employees. The corresponding suggestions provided by this research may help increase our understanding on the effect of emoticon use in IM in the workplace.

Emoticons and social interaction on the Internet: the importance of social context

The present study examines the influence of social context on the use of emoticons in Internet communication. Secondary school students (N = 158) responded to short internet chats. Social context (task-oriented vs. socio-emotional) and valence of the context (positive vs. negative) were manipulated in these chats. Participants were permitted to respond with text, emoticon or a combination of both. Results showed that participants used more emoticons in socio-emotional than in task-oriented social contexts. Furthermore, students used more positive emoticons in positive contexts and more negative emoticons in negative contexts. An interaction was found between valence and kind of context; in negative, task-oriented contexts subjects used the least emoticons. Results are related to research about the expression of emotions in face-to-face interaction.