The Science Behind Online LOLS According To Facebook

The Science Behind Online LOLS According To Facebook

Facebook has released data on the language of e-laughter (all the ‘hahas’ and ‘lols’ we use to communicate with people online) and their social subtleties.

Facebook analysed de-identified posts and comments posted in the last week of May with at least one string of characters matching laughter- variants of ‘haha’, ‘hehe’, ‘lol’, ‘lolz’ and laughing emojis.

The study did not examine any direct messages sent through Facebook Messenger, it also  focused on English speaking laughter and emojis.

The data found that:

  • 15 per cent of people included laughter in a post or comment that week.
  • The most common laugh is ‘haha’, followed by various emoji and ‘hehe’.
  • Age, gender and geographic location play a role in laughter type and length: young people and women prefer emoji, whereas men prefer longer ‘hehes’.
  • The ‘lol’ almost always stands by itself, though some rare specimens of ‘lolz’ and ‘loll’ were found
  • A single emoji is used 50 per cent of the time, and it’s quite rare to see people use more than 5 identical consecutive emoji.

What was the most popular e-laughter:

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Females were slightly more likely to ‘lol’ than their male counterparts:

11405183_139226159747028_366834226_nRead the full study here.




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