What Words Can’t Say: Emoji and other non-verbal elements of technologically-mediated communication

an article by Alexis M. Elder (University of Minnesota Duluth, Minnesota, USA) published in Journal of Information, Communication and Ethics in Society Volume 16 Issue 1 (2018)

Abstract

Purpose
This paper aims to survey the moral psychology of emoji, time-restricted messaging and other non-verbal elements of nominally textual computer-mediated communication (CMC). These features are increasingly common in interpersonal communication. Effects on both individual well-being and quality of intimate relationships are assessed. Results of this assessment are used to support ethical conclusions about these elements of digital communication.

Design/methodology/approach
Assessment of these non-verbal elements of CMC is framed in light of relevant literature from a variety of fields, including neuroscience, behavioral economics and social psychology. The resulting ethical analysis is informed by both Aristotelian and Buddhist virtue ethics.

Findings
This paper finds that emoji and other nonverbal elements of CMC have positive potential for individual well-being and interpersonal communication. They can be used to focus and direct attention, express and acknowledge difficult emotions and increase altruistic tendencies.

Research limitations/implications
This paper is conceptual, extrapolating from existing literature to investigate possibilities rather than reporting on novel experiments. It is not intended to substitute for empirical research on use patterns and their effects. But by identifying positive potential, it can help both users and designers to support individual and relational well-being.

Practical implications
The positive effects identified here can be incorporated into both design and use strategies for CMC.

Social implications
Situating ethical analysis of these trending technologies within literature from the social sciences on the effects of stylized faces, disappearing messages and directed attention can help us both understand their appeal to users and best practices for using them to enrich our social lives.

Originality/value
The paper uses empirically informed moral psychology to understand a deceptively trivial-looking phenomenon with wide-ranging impacts on human psychology and relationships.

Acknowledgments
This paper has been adapted from a chapter from a forthcoming book Friendship, Robots, and Social Media: False Friends and Second Selves by Alexis Elder (Routledge, 2018).

I simply had to look up moral psychology. Wikipedia, which I find is usually accurate about scientific subjects, tells me that moral psychology is a field of study in both philosophy and psychology.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_psychology

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