With more and more people communicating through their mobile devices than ever before, the team at OPPO Australia thought it would be insightful to take a deeper look into the impact of emoji use within messages.
The results are both interesting and informative, shedding light on the way we communicate and how it may evolve over time. We discovered that English is no longer the universal messaging language, as more than half of NSW residents (59 per cent) believe emoji has now become the universal language for messages.
Long gone are the days of writing “Yes, thank you, that sounds wonderful”. Instead, we send a simple thumbs up or a smile to get the same message across. Messaging with emoji has become international, tearing down language barriers that previously limited our communications.
These findings may come as a surprise to some, but when you take a step back, it’s easy to see why they’re so popular.
A limitation of traditional text-based communication is the inability to accurately express feelings and tone within messages. Emojis help to overcome this, allowing users to communicate complex emotions and ideas, while adding character and personality to our messages.
This is supported by the study which also found that over two thirds (67 per cent) of female and half (52 per cent) of male Australians feel that using emojis in messages allows them to express themselves better.
The research confirms that emojis are far from a temporary cultural fad, and are here to stay in a big way.
They have been warmly embraced by the public, with one in six Aussies already claiming that emoji should be recognised as its own official language. We plan on keeping a close eye on what more may come from the picture perfect icons.
- Michael Tran is CMO at OPPO Aust
