In a study recently published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B, researchers are reporting that a link has been found between the number of Facebook friends a person has and the amount of gray matter in the brain—those with a greater number of Facebook friends have more gray matter. The area referred to as “gray matter” is actually multiple brain regions, including the amygdala, which in another study, was found to be larger in individuals with broader social networks. The researchers made this discovery through brain imaging scans of university students. Read a more detailed report of the study at Medical News Today.

I’m not sure what to make of this strange study. While I believe that sociable, outgoing people may have differences in their brain structures when compared to more solitary individuals, is sociability in real life equivalent to sociability on Facebook? Do people with broader social networks offline also have a large number of Facebook friends?