The exclamation mark!!!

One of my friends recently appreciated me for my writing habit. I was intrigued with the text as it had multiple exclamation marks. How often do you use them in your text chats?

The exclamation has different impact in the virtual world. It is not the same as we use in the novels or newspaper. Back in time, it was told in journalism that you get to use exclamation mark once in your career. Make the most out of it. On the other hand,  in 2016 alone the @realDonaldTrump posted 2,251 tweets* using exclamation marks. Probably there is some relation between exclamation mark and our brain, else POTUS won’t be using them so frequently. It is all about psychology at the end.

Imagine you sent the following text to your friend: “It’s been a long time we haven’t connected, let’s connect on zoom today.” Subsequently how would you interpret the following responses?

a)Yeah b)Yeah! c)Yeah. d)Yeah!!!

All the responses had the same word, except the difference in the punctuation. But that makes a huge difference in our mind because they convey different meanings. They are like body language of the digital world. People who use more of exclamation mark are perceived happier and friendly. Per a study in 2006 of Q&A forum, the people who tend to use more exclamation marks were friendlier. Further the study noted that females are more likely to use exclamation marks than males.

However, we may get into the habit of using “!” too often. It may not be appropriate at places, depending on the situations. Especially when we use them in between the sentences. Generally, the mark is used at the end of a tweet like small statements or may be after a single world like Yes!!!, Sure! and more.

! was created as a sign of admiration back in 15th Century. With evolution the usage has evolved too specially in the fast moving digital world. We use it to describe happiness. Further the number of exclamation sign used has its effect too.  McCulloch ran a Twitter poll asking: “If I wanted to convey genuine enthusiasm to you, how many exclamation marks would I need?” After nearly 800 votes, the winner was three. She did some followup polls too but the winner remains the same. Mostly we use them to denote pure excitement or joy instead of the emoji.

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*According to the Trump Twitter Archive