I remember a survey that said essentially that (I tried for a couple minutes to find the link but I can't). I forget the actual numbers in the study but my rec

I remember a survey that said essentially that (I tried for a couple minutes to find the link but I can't). I forget the actual numbers in the study but my recollection was that the number of people who read an e-mail with a picture of a smiling person on it was significantly higher. They attributed this to a couple factors... 1. When you differentiate people tend to pause. So someone going through 20 e-mails of all text will pause on the one with a picture for no other reason than it's different. 2. People tend to reflect emotion from other people and a picture can trigger that to a lesser extent. This is a well established psychological tendency that people have. Imagine yourself walking up to a group of your friends who are all laughing at something. Even without knowing what they are laughing at you'll instinctively start to smile. Same concept. Hence the theory that people are more likely to read an e-mail with a smiling person's picture.