Could oxytocin receptors influence Instagram activity?

A new preliminary study has found that participants with a certain variant of a gene that produces oxytocin receptors tended to follow more people on Instagram. The research appears in the journal Heliyon. The authors say the study lays the groundwork for future investigations to develop a better understanding of the relationship between the genetic and environmental factors affecting a person’s sociability, particularly in an online context.

Speaking with Medical News Today, the corresponding author of the study, Dr Gianluca Esposito, said, “[c]onsidering the pivotal role that social networking sites, [like] Instagram, play in our daily lives, we conducted a multidisciplinary study to explore the mechanisms ruling online social interactions.” Dr Esposito works at the Department of Psychology and Cognitive Science at the University of Trento in Italy and the NTU Singapore.

Read the article here.

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