Last week the New York Post published an article discussing a recent study carried out on the human brain, and its effects on real life social networks.
The investigation published in the journal of Nature Neuroscience discovered that a possible ‘Facebook feature’ might be naturally occurring in the human brain, affecting the scale of an individual’s social network.
This possible feature is situated in the Amygdala, a small almond shaped body buried deep within the brain’s temporal lobe.
Findings from the report suggest that the Amygdala directly affects the width and complexity of an individual’s real life social networks.
In order to carry out the investigation brain scans were carried out on 58 volunteers. With findings suggesting that the larger the Amygdala the more friends and family the volunteer saw regularly.
Lisa Feldman Barrett, one of the authors of the report, explained that these findings did not come as a surprise as ‘the Amygdala is at the centre of a brain network that’s important for socialising.’
Barrett of Northeastern University in Boston further explained this, stating
for example, the network helps us recognize whether somebody is a stranger or an acquaintance, and a friend or a foe.”
However, questions still remain, in particular is the question: whether having a bigger Amygdala leads to more friends, or does socializing with a lot of friends create a bigger Amygdala?
Unfortunately the study cannot answer this question, although Barrett believes that both possibilities will play a role on socialising.
Arthur Toga, a brain-mapping expert at the University of California, Los Angeles, who didn’t participate in the study, called the work well done and the statistical results strong. The idea of linking a brain structure to human behaviour is “interesting and important,” he said.
Amygdala research previously made headlines earlier this month when researchers reported on a woman without a working Amygdala. The woman felt no fear in threatening situations.
