在社會語言學中，有許多關於男女在面對面溝通中不同會話型態的研究。而這些研究也顯示男女具有不同的溝通模式。相對於面對面的溝通，電腦媒介溝通的快速發展也已建立起屬於它自己的文化及語言模式，並提供了一個值得研究的新領域。隨著面對面的口語溝通轉移到電腦上書寫方式的溝通，在即時通訊上我們發現了ㄧ些如表情符號及創意書寫方式的使用：如注音文、台語、及台灣國語的書寫方式。而在網路上溝通時，我們所溝通的對象不是同性即是異性，如果我們對男女間不同的語言表現能有較多的了解，我們會有較多的機會營造一個合諧且成功的溝通。而這篇研究的主要目的是要檢驗在即時通訊上男女在表情符號及創意書寫方式上是否有差異，並且討論造成這些差異的可能因素。
在這篇研究中我們分析了三十三組由三十三個男生與三十三個女生在即時通訊上所發生的對話，每篇語料是一個即時通使用者與異性交談所構成，在收集的語料中，表情符號及創意書寫方式是我們要分析的語言表現符號，藉著分析男女使用不同數量、比率及類型的表情符號及創意書寫方式，以探討男女在以電腦為媒介的即時通上面不同的語言表現。
我們的主要的發現如下：
1.在不考慮語境下，男生使用表情符號的總數比女生多：男生使用
63個，而女生使用43個。
2.男生比女生使用較高比率非笑臉的表情符號以表達不愉快：在非
笑臉表情符號使用上，男生佔了75.4%，而女生佔了24.6%。
3.在六種語境中，女生使用最多表情符號在表示友善的語境
(34.9%)；而男生使用最多的表情符號乃在表示非善意的語境
(27%)。
4.男生在總數上比女生使用較多的創意書寫(男生96個；女生48
個)；而分開來看，男生也都比女生使用較高比例的創意書寫：男
生使用67.7%而女生使用32.3%的注音文；男生使用71.4%而女生使
用28.6%的台語書寫；男生使用76.5%而女生使用23.5%的台灣國語
書寫。
由上面的發現顯示了男女在使用表情符號方面的確存在差異，而影響這些差異的因素可能是兩性所被期待的角色不同；女生傾向使用友善和有禮貌的語言形式，而男生則比較不怕使用一些威脅他人面子的語言。而關於創意書寫方式的發現則顯示了男女可能對在即時通上新的語言表現形式有不同的態度；創意書寫是剛發展且未被所有的網路使用者公認為標準的語言形式，因此在創意書寫標準化前，女生被發現使用較少的創意書寫。
雖然已經有很多關於網路上語言使用的研究，但它們都是以英語為研究的環境。不同的社會有不同的文化及造成不同語言表現的社會因素，在我的研究中，不同性別的表情號使用可能跟之前研究有不同的解釋，因為這是在台灣網路所觀察到的；更遑論創意書寫如注音文、台語、及台灣國語的使用是台灣網路特有的書寫方式，這是值得觀察的新領域，而背後的成因也都值得我們好好探討。

In the field of sociolinguistics, many studies have been done about the different conversational styles between men and women in face-to-face communication. They proved that different genders have developed their conversational patterns. Compared with face-to-face communication, the rapid growth of computer-mediated communication has established its own culture and linguistic practices and thus has made it a new field for studies. With the transportation from face-to-face spoken conversations to written contexts on the computer, we observe the adoption of emoticons and new creative writing forms, such as Zhuyin Wen, Taiwanese and Taiwan Guoyu features on Instant Messaging. When we communicate on the Net, we either communicate with the same or the opposite gender. If we can have more understanding about the language practices between genders, we will have more chance to build a rapport and successful communication. Therefore, the primary goal of my study aimed to find out whether there is different use of emoticons and creative writings between genders on Instant Messaging. More specifically, the possible factors affecting the use of them will be discussed.
Thirty-three inter-sex dialogues, made by sixty-six subjects, thirty-three male and thirty-three female regular Instant Messaging users, are analyzed in my study. The data are written discourse of the talk made by the subjects and their interlocutors. The variables I code in this study are the use of emoticons and creative writings. To analyze the collected data, I compare the raw scores of emoticons and creative writings by different genders. I study the percentages and types of the variable as a basic analysis of the differences between women’s and men’s talk on Instant Messaging.
The main findings of this study are summarized as follows
1.Males are found to use more emoticons in total (male 63
instances versus female 43 instances) without
considering the contexts where the emoticons appear.
2.Men are more expressive than women in displaying unhappy
emotions with non-smiling emoticons (male 75.4 %versus
female 24.6%).
3.Among the six categories of contexts, women use most
emoticons in the contexts to express friendliness
(34.9%) while men to flame (27.0%).
4.Men use more of the three creative writings than women
in total (male 96 instances versus female 48 instances),
in Zhuyin Wen (male 67.7% versus female 32.3%), in
Taiwanese (male 71.4% versus female 28.6%), and in
Taiwan Guoyu (male 76.5% versus female 23.5%).
From the findings above, it shows that there do exist differences between genders on emoticon use. The possible factors that influence the differences may be the gender roles that they are expected. Women tend to adopt language forms that are more polite and friendly while men are not afraid to use language forms that may threaten others’ face. The findings of creative writings also show that men and women may possess different attitudes on the new linguistic writing systems on Instant Messaging, These creative writing systems are recently developed and have not been acknowledged as standardized language variants by all Instant Messaging users. Therefore, before the standardization, women are found to use these creative writings less than men do. Although many studies have been done about the linguistic practices on the Internet, they are done in the contexts of English. Different societies have their own cultures, and these social factors may cause various language practices. The emoticon use between genders I examined in my study may have different explanations from those in the previous studies because the Instant Messaging users are observed in the contexts of Taiwan-based society. Moreover, we can observe the use of creative writings like Zhuyin Wen, Taiwanese writing, and Taiwan Guoyu writing only on the Internet in Taiwan. It is a new field to discover, and the reasons that cause these findings may be interesting and worth to be well discussed.

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