San fransciso, calif- when the oxford english dictionary declared an emoji its 2015 word of the year, people scratched their heads. The emoji it single out- an image of a laughing yellow face crying tears of joy- did not fit most people's definition of a word. But for languages experts, or linguists , around the world , the announcement wasn't about whether the Oxford English Dictionary had lost it. (it hadn't -most linguists agree a word is a discrete unit that is meaningful; emoji fit that definition.) Rather, it was a recognition of the enormous effect yellow smiley faces and other colorful emojis representing food, animals and hand gestures have had on the way people talk online. Don't believe them? a 2015 study by Bangor University Linguistics professor Vyv Evans found that 80 percent of smartphone users in Britain use emojis , and almost 100 percent of smartphone under-25 users text with emojis . According to a report by keyboard app company, swiftkey , 74 percent of americans use emojis everyday.