Nicholas Guéguen has published a new romantic study. Professor Guéguen, whose imaginative and persistent attempts to explore the mysteries of l’amour we have sometimes chronicled is perhaps best known for his monograph “Women’s Bust Size and Men’s Courtship Solicitation“, which is considered to be one of the classics of its genre. The new paper is:
“‘Love is in the Air’: Effects of Songs With Romantic Lyrics on Compliance with a Courtship Request,” Nicolas Guéguen, Céline Jacob and Lubomir Lamy, Psychology of Music, vol. 38, no. 3, 2010, pp. 303–307. The authors, at Université de Bretagne-Sud, and at Université de Paris-Sud, explain:
“An experiment was carried out where 18–20-year-old single female participants were exposed to romantic lyrics or to neutral ones while waiting for the experiment to start. Five minutes later, the participant interacted with a young male confederate in a marketing survey. During a break, the male confederate asked the participant for her phone number…. The romantic song was ‘Je l’aime à mourir’, a French song by the songwriter Francis Cabrel and the neutral song was ‘L’heure du thé’, a French song by the songwriter Vincent Delerm…. Our hypothesis is supported by the results. Listening to romantic song lyrics, relative to neutral ones, increased the probability of accepting a request for a date some minutes later.”