How can I train my man to buy me something nice? The low-down from Sally Ann Lasson

What women want is a man who spontaneously buys them presents they’ve already told him they want. Alas, it rarely happens like that. Most men need to be taught how to choose suitable presents and most men don’t like being taught anything. In fact, they resent it. There are rare exceptions, though. When a friend of mine met her future husband, he realised straight away that he would always be out of his depth in this area. So he asked her to draw him a map of London with the shops she liked on it. To their mutual satisfaction, he’s stuck to it religiously ever since.

If your man is less amenable than this, you will have to view present-giving as a long-term project made up of hint-dropping, joint shopping trips and sighing over pictures in fashion magazines. I reckon it takes about a year for an uninitiated man to get the hang of you and for him to consider that you’re worth the heavy expenditure that good presents demand. You will feel as though you’re not making any progress for quite a long time and then, suddenly, he will come up with the goods and think it was all his own idea. Give him a big pat on the back when he does and in that way he will want to repeat the process.