Researchers in Italy have shown that animal emojis used on social networks can skew how people perceive the variety of life on Earth. The Snob project builds on these findings, highlighting a bias in online language where mammals get far more attention than other life forms. In a paper published in iScience, the authors note that online communication tends to overrepresent mammals while underrepresenting insects, plants, fungi, and microorganisms.
The study catalogued 112 organisms that have their own emojis on social platforms. Among them, 92 are animals and only 16 are plants. Fungi and microorganisms are barely represented, with only a single emoji image illustrating this group.
Francesco Fichetola, a co-author of the Gentile study, emphasized that a better visual representation of the tree of life on social media would make biodiversity appear more accurately to the public. He suggested that adding 20 to 30 additional emojis could help balance the perception of the natural world online.
In autumn reports from the press service of a major email newsletter platform, socialbites.ca noted that the flame-shaped emoji appears most frequently in emails from Russian companies, followed by the lightning bolt and a gift emoji. The analysis drew on more than 3 billion items to reach these conclusions.
Earlier, a Russian court ruled that an emoji could serve as a signature at the bottom of a document, underscoring the growing recognition of emoji as a form of digital expression and verification in professional contexts.
These findings point to a broader question for online communication: how does the emoji ecosystem shape our understanding of nature and biodiversity, and what steps can platforms take to diversify visual representation so that every branch of life is given fair visibility?