INFOGRAPHIC: Joburg rated the most negative city in the world

Johannesburg has been rated as the saddest major city in the world with Cape Town close behind.

This has been revealed by Emoji Cities, a new tool that maps what people in each city say and feel – through emojis.

                                                                       Most negative cities in the world.

Created by Smart Destinations, the tool uses Twitter data to map happiness across the globe. It also shows which cities are laughing or crying, which are sleepy and which are blowing kisses, by listing the most popular emojis, hashtags, tweets, trends and other information for each.

The data is updated every single day to show changes in sentiment and feeling, ranking the top emojis and most positive cities on a global scale.

“Most of us pay more attention to faces than we do anything else, we know experimentally that people respond differently to faces than they do to other object categories,” said Dr Owen Churches, research fellow, brain and cognition laboratory Flinders University.

Smart Destinations, which offers multiple attraction passes for more than 30 cities, created the tool to map the happiest places around the world. By also showing what is being talked about in each individual city, listing the top five trending hashtags and the five most commonly tagged accounts, people can see just how widely subjects are discussed by the world.

As the tool updates daily, positivity and overall sentiment will change in line with major events to provide a true snapshot of what the world and those in specific countries or cities are feeling and saying.

Emoji Cities includes expert comment from authorities and academics around the world, providing insight into emerging trends and patterns, and cultural and international differences.

To see what the world is talking about on Twitter, cities’ most popular emojis, and where is happiest, visit Emoji Cities.

Source: Emoji Cities.