Another Handshake Problem

[Whateverist]

The Delepines are entertaining.  Mr and Mrs Anderson, Mr and Mrs Burke as well as Mr and Mrs Carvalho will be joining them for dinner.  (Apologies in advance for the hetero-centric nature of the problem.)  

As it happens Mr Delepine is in the kitchen cooking when everyone arrives.  So only Mrs Delepine goes out to greet them alone.  Greetings are exchanged and a good deal of hand shaking takes place but not in any thorough manner.  When Mr Delepine calls them in to eat he asks how many handshakes took place outside.  No one is quite sure so he asked some questions.

Everyone is quite sure they did not shake their own hand (because that would just be silly) or that of their own mate, and no one shook hands more than once with the same person.  Each of their guests report shaking hands a different number of times, except Mrs Delepine who can't remember how many times she shook hands.  She very well might have shaken hands the same number of times as one the guests but no one remembers how many hands she shook.

With how many people did Mrs Delepine shake hands with?

[robvalue]

Hmm, neat!

This looks sort of like one of those logic problems, where you have to figure out which person lives in what house and has what in their front garden. I enjoy doing those.

I'll give this a crack later!

[pocaracas]

I like your name choices

So... 8 persons, total.
1 of them is out in the kitchen.
Brute force, assuming everyone shakes hands, but not with their respective spouses, nor themselves:
- Mrs Delepine shakes hands with 6 people
- Each of the others shakes hands with 5 people (I know they all report different numbers, but they're wrong! )
In total, 5 * 6 + 6 = 36 handshakes.

Any other solution should yield less than these 36. There's an upper bound!

---

There are 6 guests and they all report a different number of handshakes.... At most, each would have shook 5 hands, so... I'm going out on a limb and say we have a guest that shook no hands, one that shook one hand, another that shook 2 hands, another 3, another 4 and, finally, one that shakes 5 hands...
Because of the guest that shook no hands, the anti-social Mr Carvalho, Mrs Delepine couldn't have shaken everyone's hands, so.... down a notch for her... at least. But wait! If one guy shakes 5 hands, then that guy's spouse is the anti-social... Mrs Carvalho to the rescue of the family name!
If one guest shakes 5 hands, then the guest that only shakes one hand must go with that guy.... down another notch for Mrs Delepine.

Mr and Mrs Burke take a page out of the Carvalhos and one shakes 4 hands, while the other shakes 1... Mr Burke, shaking 4 hands, must be shaking Mrs Delepine's hand, because he's not shaking Mr Carvalho's, nor his own spouse, but everyone else.

And we're missing a couple, the Andersons. Mrs Anderson shaking 2 hands, and Mr Anderson shaking 3 hands. Mr Anderson shakes hands with Mr Burke and Mrs Delepine, while Mrs Anderson shakes with Mr Burke and Mrs Carvalho.

Mrs Delepine is then shaking hands with Mrs Carvalho, Mr Burke and Mr Anderson: 3 handshakes... usually people can recall up to 3 events quite easily...

---

I think Mrs Delepine needs to see a psychiatrist.

[Expired]

I'm guessing Zero times, like her husband.

[Aractus]

She shakes hands 3 times.

Proof:

The guests we'll number Person 1-6:
p.1 - "2 times": shakes hands with p.4, p.6 (p.2 is their partner).
p.2 - "3 times": shakes hands with p.4, p.6 and Mrs Delepine (p.1 is their partner).
p.3 - "1 times": shakes hands with p.6 (p.4 is their partner).
p.4 - "4 times": shakes hands with p.1, p.2, p.6 and Mrs Delepine (p.3 is their partner).
p.5 - "0 times"
p.6 - "5 times" : shakes hands with p.1-4 and Mrs Delepine (p.5 is their partner so they don't shake their hand).
Mrs Delepine: p.2, p.4, p.6.

Now you might think she should have shook the hand of all of her guests, but actually she did shake one hand of each couple.

[TheRealJoeFish]

The Delepines are entertaining.  Mr and Mrs Anderson, Mr and Mrs Burke as well as Mr and Mrs Carvalho will be joining them for dinner.  (Apologies in advance for the hetero-centric nature of the problem.)  

That's ok, I'll just pretend that Mr. Burke and Mr. Carvalho are screwing in secret when their wives are at work.

[brewer]

None. This is a gathering of germaphobes anonymous.

[ErGingerbreadMandude]

Assuming Mrs D haven't got no probs with them guests, 6.

[ErGingerbreadMandude]

No the answer is 2.
I got it.
It's two.
Fuck yeah.
Win birches

[Whateverist]

Birches?