Mid Sweden University

The usage of emojis in marketing strategies and as a digital and social shortcut for emotional response has risen significantly since their creation and subsequent launch in the late nineties. With over three thousand emojis available as of 2019 and, according to Facebook, over five billion sent each day on their instant messaging service, the breadth of their influence and societal importance is unquestionable. 

Recent studies have shown that certain aspects of consumer marketing are positively influenced by the usage of emojis but in the context of news correspondence the field of study regarding the use of emojis has large gaps. This study aims to investigate whether or not the use of emojis in a news context can affect the readers’ interpretation and perception of a text and by extension, the writer or news outlet associated with said text. 

This study was conducted as an experimental survey in which two groups each consisting of 33 university students were asked to grade the trustworthiness, objectivity and professionalism of four fabricated social media news posts. One group had line breaks in the texts of the social media posts consisting of emojis and the other group did not. Subsequent analysis of the data shows that it could be possible to affect the readers’ interpretation and perception of a text by way of emoji usage. There are however an abundance of factors that, when juxtaposed and analysed, could be the reason for the respondents differing interpretations of the texts.