Patients waiting in a doctor's clinic are either gossipy or have "fast hands." That was the finding of a study made by researchers at the University of Auckland in New Zealand in a bid to find the reason why majority of magazines in the waiting room are old and outdated.

Bruce Arroll, a doctor and professor at the university, gathered old magazines from friends and relatives and placed them in a doctor's clinic to monitor how fast these reading materials disappear. He collected 87 magazines, which after one month was down to 41, writes Business Insider.

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A browse through the titles of the magazines left behind found that four Time and 15 Economist magazines weren't filched at all. Analysis of what were stolen and what were not revealed that the newer a magazine is, the greater its chance of being taken home by a patient (of course, without permission from the doctor or receptionist!).

But other than new magazines, also stolen frequently are publications about celebrities, preferably with gossips on its. The more gossipy a magazine is perceived, based on the number of movie stars and other personalities on the cover, the higher its chances of disappearing in a few days.

Just imagine how fast the November issue of Paper magazine, featuring Kim Kardashian's butt on the cover, if it were included in the line-up!

The study, admittedly, was limited to one clinic which had about 3,000 patients who visited it within 31 days. Arroll is open to replicating the experiment in other clinics, even outside New Zealand, by collecting again old reading materials and sending them to the interested doctors so they can discover a pattern of "thievery" among patients and their companions.

Until he has established another pattern or explanation why the magazines disappear, Arroll recommends placing only Time, Economist and other serious titles in their waiting room so they don't have to buy too many titles a month replacing lost magazines.

Or perhaps go digital, as the following video suggests.

Tagsmagazines, doctor's clinic