A Sticker is Worth a Thousand Words: Characterizing the Use of Stickers in WhatsApp Political Groups in Brazil

Abstract: With the increasing use of smartphones, instant messaging platforms turned into important communication tools. According to WhatsApp, more than 100 billion messages are sent each day on the app. Communication on these platforms has allowed individuals to express themselves in other types of media, rather than simple text, including audio, videos, images, and stickers. Particularly, stickers are a new multimedia format that emerged with messaging apps, promoting new forms of interactions among users, especially in the Brazilian context, transcending their role as a mere form of humor to become a key element in political strategy. In this regard, we investigate how stickers are being used, unveiling unique characteristics that these media bring to WhatsApp chats and the political use of this new media format. To achieve that, we collected a large sample of messages from WhatsApp public political discussion groups in Brazil and analyzed the sticker messages shared in this context