Inanimate objects are more likely to seem alive to people who want to feel "connected," according to a recent study.

Researchers from Dartmouth College found that feeling socially disconnected may lead people to lower their threshold for determining that another being is animate or alive. The study sheds light on newer types of relationships that have emerged in the modern age, including relationships with pets, online avatars, and even pieces of technology, such as computers, and cellphones.

"This increased sensitivity to animacy suggests that people are casting a wide net when looking for people they can possibly relate to -- which may ultimately help them maximize opportunities to renew social connections," Katherine Powers, psychological scientist and lead researcher of the study, said.

For the study, Powers had 30 college students view images of faces, which were actually morphs created by combining inanimate faces (such as a doll's face) with human faces. The morphs ranged from 0 percent human to 100 percent human and showed both male and female faces.

The morphs were presented in random order and the students had to decide whether each face was animate or inanimate. Afterwards, they completed a survey that gauged their desire for social connections, in which they rated their agreement with statements such as "I want other people to accept me."

Researchers found that desire for social connections was associated with a lower threshold for animacy. In other words, participants who had high scores on the social connections measure didn't need to see as many human-like features in a face order to decide that it was alive.

To see if there might be a causal link, Powers and colleagues conducted another study in which they experimentally manipulated feelings of social connection.

A separate group of college students completed a personality questionnaire and were provided feedback ostensibly based on the questionnaire. In reality, the feedback was determined by random assignment. Some students were told that their future lives would be isolated and lonely, while others were told their lives would contain long-lasting, stable relationships.

As expected, students who had been told they would be isolated and lonely showed lower thresholds for animacy than those who were told they would have long-lasting relationships.

"What's really interesting here is the degree of variability in this perception," Powers said. "Even though two people may be looking at the same face, the point at which they see life and decide that person is worthy of meaningful social interaction may not be the same -- our findings show that it depends on an individual's social relationship status and motivations for future social interactions."

The findings were recently in the journal Psychological Science.