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Emoticons and Emotions: Exploring the Roles of Emoticons in Emotional Representativeness, Awareness and Management

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New Ecology for Education — Communication X Learning

Abstract

This study examines the relationship between emoticons and emotions, specifically, exploring the roles of emoticons on emotional representativeness, awareness and management. This study hypothesizes that the combination of text and emoticons has the greatest effect on emotion representativeness, awareness and management. Also, the effect of emoticons is moderated by the users’ emotions. A 3 (emotions: joy/fear/sadness) × 3 (message patterns: using emoticons only/using text only/emoticons plus text) factorial experimental design was adopted in this study. 154 participants were recruited from a private college in Hong Kong and they were randomly assigned to one of the nine conditions. The results showed that there was no significant main effect of message patterns on emotional representativeness, awareness and management. The main effect of emotions was only significant for emotional management. The interaction effects between emotions and message patterns were also insignificant. This study provides some new insights to understand the roles of emoticons in expressing emotions in Instant Messenger.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Counselling and Psychology, Hong Kong Shue Yan University, Hong Kong, China

    Wing-Yan Lau & Chi-Keung Chan

Authors
  1. Wing-Yan Lau
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  2. Chi-Keung Chan
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Correspondence to Chi-Keung Chan .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. HKAECT, Hong Kong, Hong Kong

    Will W.K. Ma

  2. HKAECT, Hong Kong, Hong Kong

    Chi-Keung Chan

  3. HKAECT, Hong Kong, Hong Kong

    Kar-wai Tong

  4. HKAECT, Hong Kong, Hong Kong

    Heidi Fung

  5. HKAECT, Hong Kong, Hong Kong

    Cheuk Wai Rose Fong

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Lau, WY., Chan, CK. (2017). Emoticons and Emotions: Exploring the Roles of Emoticons in Emotional Representativeness, Awareness and Management. In: Ma, W., Chan, CK., Tong, Kw., Fung, H., Fong, C. (eds) New Ecology for Education — Communication X Learning. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-4346-8_17

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-4346-8_17

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Singapore

  • Print ISBN: 978-981-10-4345-1

  • Online ISBN: 978-981-10-4346-8

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