Carrying a guitar can increase the chances of you getting a date by a third, according to a study by researchers from the University of South Brittany.

The study found that women were 31% more likely to give their number to a man carrying a guitar – double the amount of people who would give their number to the same man when he was empty-handed.

The study was led by Professor Nicolas Gueguen, a researcher in behavioural sciences at the University.

Gueguen hired a 20-year-old man to approach 300 women aged between 18 and 22 in a shopping centre in Brittany.

The man told each girl that they were ‘really pretty’ and asked for her phone number so they could arrange a date.

For the first 100 women he was holding a sports bag.

For the next 100 women he approached them holding a guitar case.

And for the final 100 women, the man asked them for their number without anything in his hands.

When the actor was carrying the guitar case, 31% of the women gave them his number.

When he was carrying nothing, 14% of the women gave them his number.

The biggest turn off for the women was when he was carrying the sports bag, which had a success rate of only 9%.