6 Minute English from BBC Learning English.com

Hello this is 6 Minute English from BBC Learning English. I'm Neil and I'm Beth. Can you keep a secret Neil or I use someone who

spills the beans that's an idiom meaning to tell people a secret? I'm pretty good at keeping secrets, Beth.

Unless it's giving away the ending of a movie,

I'm always doing that.

Whether you find it hard to keep secrets

or take them with you to the grave. Keeping secrets is often

considered something bad. But what if some secrets could actually make your life

better? Now psychological studies are uncovering a more positive

side to secrets suggesting that keeping good news to yourself can actually make you

feel more alive especially if you plan to share your secret with someone later.

In this program we'll be discussing the advantages of keeping secrets and, as usual, we'll be

learning some useful new vocabulary as well.

But first I have a question for you Neil.

One very famous secret is the recipe for the world's favorite soft drink Coca-Cola.

While traveling in Indonesia, BBC TV presenter Joanna Lumley believes she discovered the unknown secret ingredient. So is Coca-Cola's secret

spice A cinnamon, B nutmeg or C, Ginger?

Well, I don't know, so I'm going to guess it's Nutmeg.

Okay, I'll reveal the secret at the end of the program. This year a study published in the Journal of Personality

and Social Psychology introduced a new term to the discussion, positive secrets. Here, studies author Dr Michael Slepian of Columbia University,

discusses positive secrets with BBC World Service Program Newsday.

Yeah, so what's interesting about the idea of positive secrets is, you know, there's a set of them

...