More than 800 million people use social networking sites, and taking social media as a topic for research, the University College of London researchers’ aim to find answer to their hypotheses that internet alters brain.

In the research, it has been found that the more, one has friends, the increased is the area of his brain, and it has also come into notice that the brain is able to tell exact number of friends, one has in his Facebook account. Part of brain, which is related to it, is grey matter, as it is responsible for memory, social interaction and autism. To assess brains, researchers enrolled 125 London’s University students, and then they studied their brains through 3D.

The study that got published in the ‘journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences revealed that through their brains, they tried to assess the volunteer’s network of real friends, and comparing it with number of friends he is having on social network site, Facebook. It was found that brain was able to tell the number of friends, volunteer is having contact with.

One of the researchers, Dr. Ryota Kanai was of the view, "We have found some interesting brain regions that seem to link to the number of friends we have - both real and virtual”.

Kanai further affirmed that their further research would help them know the effect social media has on the brain, and once they get answer of it, they would be able to know the relation between the internet and the brain.

Dr. John Williams, who is the Head of Neuroscience and Mental Health, was of the view that the research is very important to know the effects of internet on the body.