What is an 'emoticon'?

An emoticon serves as a textual portrayal of a writer's mood or facial expression, typically created using keyboard characters. This means that emoticons utilize the symbols and letters available on a standard keyboard, such as a colon for eyes and a parenthesis for a smile, to visually express emotions. For example, the simple combination of a colon and a closing parenthesis forms a smiley face :) which conveys happiness or friendliness in communication.

This form of expression allows users to communicate tone and emotion in a medium that lacks verbal cues, making the message clearer and enhancing the understanding between the sender and receiver.

Other options refer to different aspects of digital communication; for instance, graphic images or animations involve visual forms of expressing emotions but are not created using keyboard characters. Cyber slang encompasses a broader category of language usage online but does not specifically refer to these textual symbols. Hence, the definition aligns precisely with the choice that identifies emoticons as character-based representations of emotions.