WHEN scrolling through your Facebook feed, what are the status updates most likely to send you into a rage? If sickening, lovey-dovey declarations or smug, look-how-many-miles-I-ran-today pronouncements are up there, you're going to like this.

A new paper from Brunel University London has revealed some fascinating findings about those supposedly self-satisfied Facebookers.

Using a sample of 555 users in the US, the study measured what psychologists call the Big Five personality traits (openness, conscientiousness, extroversion, agreeableness and neuroticism) plus self-esteem and narcissism, then respondents were asked to report on how often they write about any of a number of topics in their status updates.

Unsurprisingly, extroverts were found to update their statuses more often, while people who scored highly on openness (that is, being curious and open to new ideas and experiences) were more likely to use the platform to share intellectual content such as news articles or their political views.

But where it got really interesting was with the results for the other measures.

Narcissists were more likely to post about their achievements or their diet and exercise habits for, the researchers say, "attention-seeking and validation".

Similarly, those who were lower in self-esteem wrote updates about their significant other more frequently; not for attention, but as a way of "laying claim to their relationship when it feels threatened". Previous research has shown that people with low self-esteem tend to be scared that, to put it bluntly, they're going to get dumped.

On top of that, the narcissists reported (and we'll have to take their word for it) that they garnered more "likes" and comments, meaning their public posturing was "positively reinforced by the attention and validation they crave".

So what can we conclude from the study to help maintain our own social media sanity?

First, it's probably advisable to hide that girl from your Facebook feed who keeps sharing gym selfies and bragging about the 20th ballet barre class she's been to that week - and definitely don't like said statuses, because she's a self-absorbed moron and you're only encouraging her.

But maybe don't be so hasty with that guy who constantly writes eye-rollingly soppy odes to his beloved "babydoll", punctuated with that most excruciating of all hashtags, #blessed - because, if anything, he needs your sympathy.

GETTING ON THE NET

THE number of people in the UK who have never used the internet is gradually falling, with 86 per cent of adults saying they've been on the web in the last three months (according to the most recent Office For National Statistics Internet Users report), up six per cent since 2011. But there are still 5.9 million people in the UK who have never been online and, worryingly, the report revealed that age and disability are barriers to net use. For the first quarter of 2015, only 33 per cent of over-75s said they had recently been online compared with 99 per cent of 16 to 24-year-olds, and across all age groups the proportion of recent net users was lower for people who were disabled.

MAKING IT UP AS THEY GO ALONG

AS the boundaries continue to blur on YouTube and it's harder to tell what's an advert and what's not, it seems viewers are starting to wise up. A video of a make-up tutorial by a blogger using Max Factor products posted on Procter & Gamble's Beauty Recommended YouTube channel was later banned, because the Advertising Standards Authority determined that it wasn't clear to viewers that this was actually an advert (P&G also owns Max Factor). The ASA said better labelling was needed in future, and P&G have said they will comply. The ban also highlights the fact that not all beauty bloggers are lining up to work with the big brands - the person who reported the offending video was also a blogger.

GRAB BAGS

SOCIAL shopping and challenge apps are two big trends in tech at the moment, so it was only a matter of time before a product arrived that combined the two. Mainly focused on fashion, Wamo (wamo.co.uk) lets you snap pics and grab images from websites to curate lists of the items you love, hate, want and need, then share them with pals. Plus it offers the chance to win designer swag and gift vouchers with daily challenges. Upscale brands like Selfridges and Michael Kors are already on board, and best of all, the tasks aren't that challenging at all. Download it from Google Play or iTunes.