Your Smiling Face is Impolite to Me: A Study of the Smiling Face Emoji in Chinese Computer-Mediated Communication.

This study investigates how the smiling face emoji influences the interpretation of politeness in utterances within WeChat communication, focusing on the effects of the emoji itself, the age of the interactants, and the communicative context. Experimental results show that the smiling face emoji tends to decrease the perceived politeness of polite utterances but does not soften the illocutionary force of impolite ones. Additionally, younger Chinese users are more likely to interpret the emoji as sarcastic or impolite, especially in contexts involving expressions of feelings, whereas older users tend to view it more positively and may use it to mitigate impoliteness. These findings highlight the socio-cultural and platform-specific nuances of emoji use in virtual communication and suggest caution in using the smiling face emoji in sensitive conversational situations to avoid miscommunication.