SHANGHAI, April 23 -- Last year's most popular word used in domestic issues was "harmony," "炒" while those for global topics were "chaos" and "oil," according to an online survey conducted by Sina.com and the National Language Resources Tracing and Research Center.

The establishment of a "harmonious socialist society" has topped the Chinese government's agenda in recent years. It is defined as one featuring socialist democracy, the rule of law, equity, justice, sincerity, amity, vitality, stability and order, as well as harmonious co-existence between man and nature.

"炒" has multiple meanings in Chinese, including "investing in" stocks and funds, "speculating" in the real estate market, and "sensationalize" news, which were all under spotlight in 2006, the annual survey said.

"Chaos" and "oil" are selected as the most popular words for global issues.

Hundreds of thousands of netizens participated in the survey, which kicked off in March.