2. Give Reasons For Your Requests (And Not “Because I Said So:)

The Copy Machine Study was a simple behavioral study in which a person walked up to someone waiting for a library copy machine and asked if they could cut in front of them. They then gave one of three reasons:

1. “Version 1 (request only): “Excuse me, I have 5 pages. May I use the Xerox machine?”
2. Version 2 (request with a real reason): “Excuse me, I have 5 pages. May I use the xerox machine, because I’m in a rush?”
3. Version 3 (request with a fake reason): “Excuse me, I have 5 pages. May I use the xerox machine, because I have to make copies?

Version 3 simply takes the request to use the Xerox machine adds the word ‘because’,  and the gives a ‘reason’ that makes no sense: “I have to make copies.” Of course everyone waiting needed to make copies. Though the reason contained no new information, this senseless cause produced amazing results. The researchers found the following: when someone didn’t give a reason for why they needed to use the copier, only 60 percent of people let the researcher skip the line. But when the researcher gave a reason—any reason—even one that didn’t make sense, just by having the word “because” in the sentence, 93 percent of people let the researcher skip ahead in line almost the identical number of people who let him skip when he gave a reason that made sense. “In his book “Influence” Robert Cialdini explained this phenomenon by saying, “A well-known principle of human behavior says that when we ask someone to do us a favor we will be more successful if we provide a reason. People simply like to have reasons for what they do.”