What It Is

Smileys and emoticons are used in written forms of communication to describe a particular emotion or mood that is within the message that is sent. They consist of eyes formed by colons (or semicolons to show winking) and mouths formed by various letters or symbols ranging from a D to symbolize a large smile or a left hand parentheses to express sadness. Here are several example: : ( ; ) : D.

The difference between emoticons and smileys is that emoticons are not made of text symbols but are instead little pictures that express emotions. You can find them at smiley Central.

Thanks to the use of text messaging on cell phones, instant messaging (IM) and message boards the use of smileys and emoticons for informal written communications has soared.

With the increasing use of the internet and wireless digital telecommunications, the adoption of the smileys has taken prominence. This movement was initiated by the youth and there is probably not a young person out there who does not know the meaning or usage of smileys.

While the early use of smileys expressed only happiness and sadness, the variety of symbols has increased to now be able to show disbelief, anger, surprise and playfulness as well.

The use of these expressions seems to disproportionately favored by females rather than males. The cause for this may be that females feel more comfortably expressing emotions, or perhaps they are more familiar with nuanced telecommunication techniques,

Some have criticized the use of these symbols as detrimental to the depth of human communication, but these don’t address the obvious benefits of use. These benefits include faster communication, the allowance of intimate text messages with little effort.

Smileys have all been figured out and do not have the range of emotions that emoticons can express. The future of these symbols seem to have hit a plateau and the future or more nuanced symbols would require a wider range of symbols for longer text messages.