How do you use smileys and emoticons?

I am working on a master’s thesis about the use of emoticons and smileys in written language (English and Swedish).

Lately this linguistic phenomena has caught my interest and I am now wanting to do some research on how people use them and understand them. I see them as a very informative linguistic function that contains a lot of information and can be the difference on how you grasp and interpret a text. I actually think that it won’t be long until smileys and emoticons are accepted as a form of punctuation. And I think it’s a good idea.

So if you don’t mind I would love to hear your thoughts on emoticons and smileys.