After reading this article that was provided it made me think on the topic of emojis and mhealth. Previously I have not thought too much about this topic and I guess I would not have put the two together. When I think of emojis, I think of texting family and friends, possibly putting them on social media. When It comes to mhealth or health information in general I do not necessarily think the two go together because health is a very serious topic. Emojis for me are supposed to be just something fun you add into your text to show some emotion. Texting or relaying messages over text, email or however you are giving out information to your reader, it can be hard to show emotion which leaves out interpretation and miscommunication. I can see why there might be a need for adding emojis to some messages but I think it is not always needed. Sometimes for myself, I think emojis can be unprofessional or not seen as serious when they are added to some text. The writer mentions that in this article and I think that can be a very big concern. Young people do tend to use a lot of emojis and it can be looked at as a good way to connect with them on some levels. I just do not know if that would work with health. I definitely believe there is a time and place for emojis and this might not be it.
“If the topic is relevant to the audience and the argument is strong enough to withstand participant elaboration,
our research would suggest that messages that use a non-narrative approach without emojis would allow for
increased elaboration, perceptions of credibility, and reduced counter-arguing”
This quote added above was from the article and it was in the conclusion of their findings. I thought it was interesting they brought the information that if the argument is strong enough to withstand the reader's elaboration that it might be okay to use emojis but if the argument could be up for interpretation for the reader it would probably not be the best idea. With how the internet and how people are nowadays, leaving information up for interpretation is not a very good idea. People can go crazy at times picking apart information and making their own assumptions.
To conclude, I thought this article was interesting, I not completely sure if I totally understood anything but it definitely was an enlightening topic to think about when it comes to the topic of health and emojis.
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