A major problem for computer mediated communication (CMC) is the marked lack non-verbal information compared to other communications styles (e.g., handwriting). This study examines the role of face characters,known as “emoticons” (a term based on “emotional icons”), in CMC. This study investigated the effects of emoticons on impressions in two experiments. In experiment 1, three emoticons were presented alone and the participants were asked to rate how the emoticons were perceived using the SD method with 19 adjective pairs. A profile of the ratings indicated that different emoticons elicit different impressions. Experiment 2 compared impression ratings for an entire message under two conditions;a text-only message and a message with emoticons.The results indicated that the message with emoticons evoked more positive impressions towards the complete message. This effect does not depend on impressions for the emoticons themselves. The findings from these experiments indicate that the use of emoticons can serve to improve impressions within communications.