What does that smiley face mean? And should you use it?

There’s been buzz about the use of emoticons like the smiley face 🙂 or wink 😉 in the workplace. A New York Times article in 2011. Huffington Post took on the topic in a 2011 article and again in this 2012 article. A post by Gemma Stoyle at Linguistics Research Digest spurred my thinking about what emoticons mean and when they’re appropriate.

Research by Eli Dresner and Susan C. Herring identified three “meanings” of emoticons.

First, an emoticon can indicate emotion. This is the prototypical use where the visual is mapped directly onto a facial expression.

• I just got paid 😀  means the writer is feeling very happy about the message he or she just wrote.

Second, an emoticon can have a non-emotional meaning. In these cases, the emoticon represents a conventional facial expression.

• She is so graceful 😉 means the writer is using a wink to indicate his or her intent to make a joke with the message written.

Third, an emoticon can have a non-emotional meaning that is not represented with a conventional facial expression.

• The movie was stupid 🙂 means the writer is only asserting the message he or she has written not actually complaining.

When should you use emoticons in the workplace?

Research suggests the salient contextual factors with emoticon use have to do with level of formality. A message with content the reader might be sensitive to (like constructive criticism) deserves more formality than one with routine content (like acknowledging receipt of a package). Likewise, a message intended for a stranger deserves more formality than one for a close friend. Because some media are more formal (like email) than others (like twitter messages), it’s more acceptable to use emoticons in the less formal medium.

Personally, I use emoticons only in messages that border on personal — even though they might contain some workplace-related content. (A reminder: everyone code-switches based on the context within which a message is written.) I see emoticon use as a question of style. My video tutorial on word choice includes a discussion of levels of formality. An informal style (with contractions, exclamation points, and emoticons) can be appropriate for a written workplace message. But if I’m writing for a stranger I opt for a more formal style. And if I’m writing for someone I know well enough to predict he is linguistically conservative, then I opt for a more formal style. I don’t want the reader distracted by my style. Being a pro writer means choosing the appropriate level of formality for a specific message. And that includes choosing emoticons.

Postscript: Humans are meaning making machines. So it isn’t surprising that emoticons have become popular in communication media that don’t include body language, which provides critical cues to the meaning of a speaker’s message. There is even some evidence that emoticons were used before the digital age. The New York Times published a story about a possible emoticon in the paper’s transcript of an 1862 speech given by President Lincoln. (See the related article link below.) And a medieval book historian from the Netherlands found this emoticon added in the 14th or 15th century to a page in a 13th century manuscript. 

Related articles

• Code-switching in written language (proswrite.com)
• Is that an emoticon in 1862? (nytimes.com)
• Medieval smiley face (erikkwakkel.tumblr.com)
• Emoticons for brands: The dos and don’ts (prdaily.com)