(This posting includes a handout LINK AT THE END OF THIS POST which you are welcome to use with your students.) *

I was totally confused. I saw 18-year-old Ronny walking outside his house carrying a guitar case, but I knew he didn’t play the guitar. I asked him if he was starting to take lessons. He said, “No, but I’m planning to find a date for a party. And I just learned three tricks to do that, and one of them uses a guitar case.” Then he told me about the three interesting experiments.

Researchers sent a very handsome guy to a shopping mall in France to ask women for their phone numbers so that he could call them for a date. He stood in front of different types of stores (for example, a bakery, a shoe store, a café) and as women walked by, he approached them. However, he wasn’t very successful. Only 13% of the women gave him their numbers when he stood in front of those shops. Surprisingly, however, he was twice as successful (26% of the time) in front of one particular shop: a flower shop.

The researchers have a theory about these results. (See complete article below.)

For background information about these articles and for suggestions for how to use them with your students, see  • Introducing “Short, High-Interest Readings”  Also, I’ll be adding more of these articles in the right-hand column: ESL Reading> Short, High Interest Articles for Extensive Readings

Here is the 10th article. You can download the article for your students by clicking on the link at the end. Also included are three optional exercises: True-False Questions; Paraphrasing Exercise; Reflection Exercise.

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