Inserting emoticons in work emails is a double-edged sword. The risk is losing credibility: the results of an academic study show that “smiley faces” don’t always communicate exactly what one intends…

It might not be a good idea to write an email to a colleague and insert an emoticon to “seem friendlier.” Even with the intent of adding a more casual tone to the conversation, it’s not guaranteed that the recipient will interpret the message the same way. In fact, this could end up increasing the distance between you.

According to a study conducted simultaneously by the Universities of Haifa, Negev, and Amsterdam, the use of emojis could give colleagues the impression of lesser competence, which in turn might lead them to share fewer details or information with the sender. The research, which involved 549 participants from 29 different countries, was reported by the World Economic Forum.

The study, published in the Personality Science Journal under the title «The Dark Side of a Smiley», reveals:

“First impressions are heavily influenced by emotional expressions, such as smiles. In face-to-face interactions, those who smile are perceived as warmer and more competent compared to those who never smile. In computer-mediated communications, primarily text-based, the smiley serves as the digital representation of a smile. But can it truly be considered a substitute?”

Three different experiments were conducted on this subject. In one, participants were asked to evaluate a work email both in terms of professionalism and emotional tone: the messages were nearly identical, with the only difference being the inclusion of smileys in some.

The research revealed that, unlike “real” smiles, emoticons do not communicate greater warmth and tend to undermine the perception of competence.

An emoji is not a smile…

The strongest confirmation of this theory came from the responses themselves: emails containing emoticons received fewer professional details in the replies.

Additionally, an unexpected factor emerged: gender. When the sender’s gender was not clearly identifiable, the presence of emoticons led recipients to assume the sender was female. Fortunately, this did not show any correlation with the perceived competence.

Considering that the perceptions recorded transcended the participants’ countries of origin, the study results become even more intriguing. The difficulty of recognizing the appropriateness of tone and register is perhaps one of the greatest challenges in “mediated” communication—and the experiment demonstrates this. The results indicate:

“People tend to assume that a smiley is a virtual smile. However, the results of this study show that, in the workplace, at least for initial interactions, this assumption is incorrect.”. 

Communication cannot ignore the definition of context—shaped by factors such as knowledge, environment, and the relationship between participants. Smiles have almost become automatic in writing… but when in doubt, it’s better to think twice before including one!

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