Turns out those handy smiley icons on your mobile phone are good for more than just a giggle.

An annual survey from Match.com has found that people who use emojis – the name given to those tiny face, animal or food icons used in text message chats – have more sex than those who don’t.

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The dating website’s Singles in America survey of 5675 singles across the United States found emoji users to be more sexually active, more likely to go on dates and more likely to get married than their non-emoji counterparts.

The wink face is the most popular emoji.

In fact, single people who used more than one emoji in every text message were the most likely to have sex at least once a month.

“[Emoji users] want to give their texts more personality,” Dr Helen Fisher, a biological anthroplogist who worked on the study, told Time magazine.

“Here we have a new technology that absolutely jeopardizes your ability to express your emotion… there is no more subtle inflection of the voice … and so we have created another way to express emotions and that is the emoji.”

The finding suggests emoji users value partners who also consider communication a desirable trait, thus increasing their level of interaction.

According to the study, the most commonly used emoji is the wink face.