Faster than the Speed of Lol: Examining Digital Articulatory Processes of Text-Based Paralinguistic Features in Mobile Communication
This study examines how individuals compose text-messages key-by-key on mobile virtual keyboards, and how real-time performances reflect the iterative process of constructing and maintaining interpersonal relationships via linguistic capital. Using keystroke logging methods, this study reports on weeklong observations of how participants (N = 10) composed text messages as part of everyday mobile communication while using LogKey, a virtual keyboard application made exclusively for this study. Analysis examined the timing of keystrokes for composing paralinguistic features—such as variants of Lol and Haha—at different discursive positions (i.e., the beginning or end of a message), with linear mixed effects models finding that these features were composed significantly faster when at the start of a message (p < 0.001). Together with textual analysis of sent messages, this study suggests that discursive processes for managing face in text messaging is entangled with cognitive and psychomotor articulation via the virtual keyboard.
