Higher emotional intelligence is linked to more emoji use with friends, while avoidant attachment is associated with less emoji use with friends and dating or romantic partners, according to a study published December 4, 2024, in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Dr. Simon Dubé, Research Fellow at The Kinsey Institute, Indiana University, U.S., and colleagues. This pattern of results varies across genders and relationship types, with women using emojis with friends and family more frequently than men.
Emojis are characters depicting emotions, objects, animals, and more. They can be sent via computers or smartphones—alone or with text—to create more complex meaning during virtual communications. Assessing how emoji use may vary depending on communication and interpersonal skills can provide insights into who employs emojis and the psychological mechanisms underlying computer-mediated communication. Despite the pervasiveness of emoji use in our daily social lives, relatively little is known about who uses emojis beyond evidence of differences related to gender and personality traits.
To fill this knowledge gap, Dube ́and colleagues investigated associations between emoji use frequency, attachment style, and emotional intelligence across genders and relationship types in a sample of 320 adults. Emotional intelligence is the ability to process and manage one's emotions and those of others, while attachment styles refer to patterns of how individuals relate to others in close relationships, influenced by early interactions with primary caregivers. These styles are broadly classified into three types: anxious, avoidant, and secure attachment. Both anxious and avoidant attachment styles indicate a child's lack of security with their primary caregiver. In contrast, children with a secure attachment style tend to be enthusiastic when reunited with their caregivers after a brief separation.
The results revealed that individuals with higher emotional intelligence and secure attachment may employ emojis more frequently. For women, higher levels of attachment avoidance were associated with sending and receiving emojis less often with friends and dating or romantic partners. For men, higher levels of attachment avoidance were linked to sending fewer emojis to such partners. In addition, women used emojis more than men, but this difference was specific to interactions with friends and family.
One limitation of the study is that the participants were mostly white, educated, married, and English-speaking heterosexual individuals who were living in the U.S. at the time. But according to the authors, this work opens new research avenues at the intersection of psychology, computer-mediated communication, and the study of attachment and emotional intelligence.
The authors add: "The way we interact during virtual communications may reveal something more about ourselves. It is not just a smiley face or heart emoji: it's a way to convey meaning and communicate more effectively, and how you use it tells us something about you."
