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Category: Audience: Youth/Teens

New Global Study Reveals the Emojis That Make You More (Or Less) Attractive

by Rohit Bhargava

Forget the best and worst pickup lines, now thanks to Adobe all single people have some data on the emojis to use (and which ones to avoid) when trying to appear more attractive. This is just one data point from the recently released 2022 U.S. Emoji Trend Report from Adobe’s font team. Other conclusions from the report:

  • Adding emojis to your messages makes you cooler, friendlier and funnier.
  • Emojis can boost mental health by making it easier to express ourselves.
  • The crying while laughing emoji is the #1 favorite for U.S. users.

Back to dating, the study also found that more than half of participants are likely to “use even more emoji” with someone they are interested in. Apparently “emojis make a lasting romantic impression.” The data has spoken. Although you probably shouldn’t need a survey to tell you sending an eggplant emoji after a first date is a bad choice. 

Monopoly Makes Kids Angry, For Their Own Good

by Rohit Bhargava

“Throwing the Monopoly board across the room has the potential to strengthen your relationship with your family.” That’s the unusual insight at the heart of a new brand advertising campaign from Monopoly that showcases kids raging after a turn doesn’t go their way.

I really wish I was in the room when they presented the insight behind this campaign to Hasbro. It’s bold, clever and deep in a way you don’t expect marketing to be. If it hasn’t already, this is sure to win some industry awards. And definitely make the Scrabble team jealous. I mean, for kids and adults alike, that’s a way more frustrating game than Monopoly ever was.

How To Archive Yourself In the Digital Age

by Rohit Bhargava

“I thought self-archiving could lead to self-actualization. I filled as many spaces as I could with information, whether it was on my blog, in Facebook albums, on Twitter, or on any of the many social media platforms I’ve used through the years. It was like collecting data on myself. But I also had an overall fear of letting go, of impermanence. I was so scared of forgetting pieces of myself—even pieces I longed to discard, like bad relationships and bad friendships and, I guess, other people in general. They discarded me more easily than I discarded them.”

I have the luxury to remember myself cooler than I actually was in school. As I have sometimes shared on stage, there are no social media posts from the ’90s to contradict how I think of my younger self from 25 years ago. The digital archives we are now creating for ourselves can be a gift, but also can weigh us down. Writer Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya explores this idea in an essay this week that suggests perhaps the path to self awareness requires deleting the past … a conclusion she reaches after much soul searching:

“Easing up on my self-archiving felt like building new trust with myself, giving myself permission to change and grow. I used to believe saving everything was the only way to find out what I really wanted, who I wanted to be. But when I delete things, I just make space for something new.”

It’s not easy to admit, (Read more...)