lies

Women More Likely to Lie About Reading Classics

Photo: Focus Features

In a survey of 2,000 Britons, 62 percent admitted to lying about having read the classics in order to appear smarter. Women were more likely than men to claim to have read novels when they’d only seen the movie or mini-series version, while men were more prone to lying about academic achievements or jobs, and twice as likely to “cite famous quotations to appear wise and worldly.” The most commonly lied-about books were 1984, War and Peace, and Great Expectations. The poll, conducted by one of the U.K.’s “leading research teams,” was commissioned for a DVD release of U.S. sitcom The Big Bang Theory.

Women More Likely to Lie About Reading Classics