Born Lucky: The Genetics of the Four-Leaf Clover - Facts So Romantic
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Each year, from 1913 to 1917, the psychologist Edmund S. Conklin would hand out a questionnaire to his new psychology students. Conklin wanted to see which superstitious habits or beliefs were the most and least enduring. He found that just over a quarter of college students believed in lucky four-leaf clovers, making it the second most commonly cited superstition. Knocking on wood was first. (The top five are still with us today, though not the sixth. Sleeping on a wedding cake may be ill-advised, but bad luck?) For centuries, various cultures have fixated on the rare four-leaf clover, a tradition that “began when superstitions, myths and legends were strong,” reported the New York Times in 1990. “According to English folklore, if someone dreams of clover, it means a happy marriage (...)