[Merged] Emoticon language is 'shaping the brain'

[Still Waters]

Emoticons such as smiley faces are a new language that is changing our brain, according to new Australian research.

Since emoticons first appeared in the 1980s, they have become an integral part of our communication, especially in text messages and emails.

http://www.abc.net.a.../06/3938772.htm

[Eldorado]

An x-certificate Sesame Street world is where we are heading.

[Space Commander Travis]

So what they're basically saying in academese is that is , but (: is .

[DeWitz]

How does one dumb down for the already dumbed-downers? Can a person regress any further than many already have in this Westernized culture? Can one re-enter the womb and be born again, dumb, dumber. . . dumber. . .then. . . dumbest?

[Leonardo]

Human brain reacts to emoticons as real faces

Just a few decades after they were invented, emoticons have become an indispensable part of online communication - so much so that the human brain now reacts to them in the same way as a real face

Emoticons such as :-) have become so important to how we communicate online that they are changing the way that our brains work.

They are used to provide clues to the tone of SMS, emails and tweets that can be hard to succinctly describe in words alone. But Dr Owen Churches, from the school of psychology at Flinders University in Adelaide, has found that they have become so important that we now react to them in the same way as we would to a real human face.

When we see a face there is a very specific reaction in certain parts of the brain such as the occipitotemporal cortex. When that image of a face is inverted there is another very specific reaction. This can be tracked using advanced brain scanning techniques.

source

A couple of things I'd note about this study:

First, we don't really know that this recognition of the emoticon as a face is recent - in fact, I'd suggest that ancient art indicates the stylising of faces began many thousands of years ago.

Second, I'd like to know whether this 'left-to-right' recognition is universal, or dependent on the writing of language in either a left-right or right-left orinetation. This orientation of recognition is the more surprising aspect of the study, imo.

[Leonardo]

Sorry, I did a brief search but it obviously wasn't thorough enough!