微信朋友多的人，都有一個共同特點

If you don't have a lot of friends on social media, it may mean that you are just a little less concerned with material possessions in your everyday life.
如果你在社交網站上的朋友不多，這可能意味着你對日常生活中的物質所有物並不十分在意。

According to a new study, materialistic people tend to have a lot more Facebook friends than non-materialistic people, collecting them like they would physical objects. They also spend a lot more time on Facebook than non-materialistic people, and are more likely to compare their lives to the lives of others on the social network.
一項新研究發現，崇尚物質的人比非物質主義的人擁有更多的社交網朋友，共同的物質愛好將他們聯繫起來。他們在社交網絡上花費的時間也比非物質主義的人多，也更願意在社交網絡上把他們的生活與其他人的生活相比較。

Phillip Ozimek of Ruhr-University Bochum in Germany, have created a new theory to explain why this occurs. They call it the Social Online Self-Regulation Theory.
德國魯爾大學的研究者 Phillip Ozimek創立了一種新理論來解釋這一現象發生的原因。他們將其稱之爲社交網絡在線自我約束理論。

"Materialistic people use Facebook more frequently because they tend to objectify their Facebook friends - they acquire Facebook friends to increase their possessions," Ozimek said.
Ozimek稱，“崇尚物質的人登錄社交網絡更爲頻繁的原因在於，他們會利用社交網絡上的朋友實現自己的物質需求——他們在社交網上交朋友的目的就在於增加自己的物質所有物。”

"Facebook provides the perfect platform for social comparisons, with millions of profiles and information about people. And it's free - materialists love tools that do not cost money!"
“社交網絡提供了完美的平臺可供人們相互攀比。這裏有數以百萬的檔案和個人資料。而且都是免費的——物質主義者喜歡不花錢的工具！”

The authors conducted their research on 531 Facebook users, divided into two groups. The first group of 242 was a pilot study; the second aimed to replicate the first group's results.
研究者對531名社交網用戶進行了調查，將他們分爲兩組，第一組有242名成員，是一項前導性研究；第二組研究的目的是驗證第一組研究的結果。

Both groups were given a Likert scale questionnaire to gauge how they use Facebook, how much they compare themselves to others, level of materialism, how much they think of Facebook friends as objects, and how much status or other benefits they can gain from their Facebook friends.
兩組受訪者都被要求填寫一份李克特量表問卷調查，旨在調查他們使用社交網絡的方式，他們愛與同伴相互攀比的程度，他們崇尚物質的程度，在多大意義上將社交網絡上的朋友視爲一樣物品，他們通過社交網絡上的朋友能獲得何種身份認同或其他益處。

Options included statements with which the participants had to agree or disagree, such as "I admire people who own expensive homes, cars, and clothes," "I often compare how I am doing socially," and "Having many Facebook friends contributes more success in my personal and professional life."
調查問卷中包括若干判斷題，受訪者需要選擇自己同意或者否認那些描述，例如“我羨慕那些擁有豪宅，豪車，名貴衣服的人”，“我經常把自己的社交生活與他人相互比較”，“在社交網絡上擁有許多朋友能讓我的個人生活更充實，事業更加成功”。

They were also asked to supply the number of their Facebook friends.
受訪者還要彙報自己在社交網站上的朋友的人數。

In both the pilot and the replication group, the team found a correlation between a high number of Facebook friends, objectification of those friends, time spent on Facebook, a propensity to compare oneself to others, and materialism .
在前導性研究組和後續研究組中，研究團隊都發現了社交網絡朋友多與物化這些朋友，在社交網絡上花的時間，與他人相互攀比的傾向，物質崇拜幾者之間的相互關聯性。

Previous research in 2014 found that materialistic people were more likely to "Like" brand pages, concluding that the biggest fans of a brand were the most materialistic - and that interacting with brand pages on Facebook was partially about display.
先前一項2014年的研究發現物質主義的人更傾向於在品牌主頁上點贊，同時某一品牌的忠實粉絲也是最崇尚物質的——在社交網上與某品牌主義互動很大程度上是爲了曬自己的所有物。

Friends are not the same as brands, but public image may still have something to do with it. As noted in a 1994 paper, materialism is strongly associated with items that can be displayed publicly.
朋友與名牌不是一回事，但是仍然與公衆形象相關。1994年的一篇報刊文章曾說過，物質主義與能公開展示的所有物有着深刻的關聯性。

The researchers were careful to stress that there is nothing inherently wrong or bad about the way materialistic people use social networking. On the contrary, they said, this is just how some people achieve their goals and have fun.
研究者們謹慎的強調，崇尚物質的人利用社交網絡的方式並沒有本質上的對錯可言。恰恰相反，他們指出，這就是一些人實現目標，娛樂消遣的方式。

"Social media platforms are not that different from other activities in life - they are functional tools for people who want to attain goals in life, and some might have negative consequences for them or society," Ozimek said.
“社交網絡平臺和生活中的其他活動並沒有什麼區別——對那些想要實現生活目標的人來說它們是實用性的工具，有些社交網絡平臺可能會對用戶或者社會產生負面影響。”