Money can`t buy me love? Well, the song writer may have felt that way, but 34 percent of those responding to Money magazine`s fourth annual survey
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”Americans and Their Money” believe that more money might improve their sex lives.
Chief among those who link wealth with good sex are many baby boomers and those with low incomes. Forty-one percent of those earning less than $15,000 a year thought that money might make their sex lives better, while 30 percent of those paid $50,000 or more thought so. Among respondents ages 35 to 49, 43 percent thought money could buy them better love. Not surprisingly, only 23 percent of those 65 and older agreed.
Men (37 percent) believed in the aphrodisiac qualities of cash more than women (30 percent).
Hurtful hints
If as a child you live around people who suffer lots of pain, as an adult you may hurt more than those who grow up in less pain-filled households, a psychologist at North Dakota State University says.
Patrick Edwards tested the reactions of 228 college students to common discomforts such as headaches, and compared them with the students` memories of pain experienced by their parents and brothers and sisters.
Edwards found that those who lived around more pain as kids experienced more pain from the common discomforts. He offered three possible explanations for the correlaton:
First, hurting parents may provide pain-filled role models for their children. Second, genetic characteristics may make some people more vulnerable to pain than others. Third, expressing pain may be a way of gaining attention from others, as well as special favors or treatment.
Fly by night
The Gallup Organization checked to see how many Americans saw Halley`s Comet during its long-awaited appearance in the fall of 1985. While 92 percent knew the comet was coming, only 6 percent–10 million people–actually saw it. Another 2 million thought they might have seen it, the survey found. The rest of us presumably passed our nights with prime-time TV.
A fast buck
The fastest-growing franchises in the United States are fast-food restaurants, a Venture magazine study reports. Over the past two years, each of the fast-food franchisers listed in Venture`s top 100 opened an average of 160 new eateries. Franchised distributors of videotape placed second, with 130 new units per franchisor. Health-and-fitness franchises were third, ice cream and yogurt franchises fourth and maintenance and cleaning franchises fifth.