Things you learn when you update your sidebar

So I'm adding Freakonomics to my "By My Bed" list on the sidebar and in the process I find a little gem from the book that Amazon has made available to the general public: the endnotes to the last chapter on the economics of baby names (something that Del proposed analyzing a few weeks ago in the comments to this entry).

Anyway, it's a list of children's names followed by their mothers' years of education. You can read the whole thing here. While there was plenty of pretension on both ends of the spectrum, some  general patterns emerged:

High End Generally, in women with 15 years or more of education, literary names (characters and authors) and those of historical figures and ancient deities made a strong showing, suggesting that a practical use for liberal arts degrees may have indeed been found. To wit:

Girls: Charlotte 14.98, Cordelia 15.19, Jane 15.12, Jemma 15.04, Madeline 15.12, Maya 15.26, Phoebe 15.18,

Boys: Atticus 14.97, Alistair 15.34, Keller 15.07,  Zebulon 15.0, Michelangelo 15.58,  Reagan  14.92, Romain  15.69,  Satchel  15.52, Tennyson, 15.63,  Willem 15.38, Winston 15.07

Low End Among mothers with fewer than 13 years of education, names that represent concepts,  virtues, months, cars, meteorological phenomena, undergarments, or strippers were very popular. I submit:

Girls: Cammie 12.0, Chastity 10.66, Cherokee 11.86, Crimson 11.53, December 12.0, Destiny 11.65, Laci 12.41, Ladonna 11.60, Lexus 12.55, Lizbeth 9.66 (ouch), Patience 11.8, Precious 11.30, September 12.8, Skylynn  12.61, Sunshine 12.03, Storm 12.31, Trinity 12.6

Boys: Justice 12.45, Moises 9.69 (Moses came in at 13.11), Rocky, 11.47, Sergio 11.92

Now for the real issue: Why only the mother's years of education? Is it because, even in the ideal child-bearing and -rearing environment, with the father appropriately involved and responsible, the mother still has more say than the father in deciding the child's name, or because the mother is always assumed to be primarily responsible for how the child turns out in every respect?  Read the book to find out.

Comments

[Kathy]

Okay, I need to defend my attorney friend Lizbeth. Don't know how many years of education her mother had, though. I had nineteen years of education, and I have a Patricia and an Allison (both named after family members). Does that disprove the theory?

[Liz]

There's something to that "mom chooses the name" thing, although I swear, I consulted my husband, really.

I recently went to a high school reunion (no, I'm not saying how many years), and saw my two best girlfriends from high school. None of us had seen each other or been in contact at all for many years, and all three of us had two sons, and had given them the same names. Weird, huh?

[Del]

only mother's years of education: I'm sure it's because, what with all these unwed mothers, they had more complete stats for the moms than the dads.

Liz, that is weird. Like those twin stories. Maybe you all had crushes on the same boys? :)

I notice Braxton isn't on the list.

Signed, Danielle, 13.69. (Which is almost exactly how much education my mom had, if you count the secretarial school.)

[John]

Moms do appear to have a lot more say on naming the children, at least in my family.

My mother proposed the name, and Dad have veto power.

My wife proposed the names, and I was allowed to veto, and comment, but she had the final say.

In both cases everyone was happy.

[Coe Douglas]

I wonder where the really weird names come from?

[King Cockfight]

Given how much education these mothers had, and my experiences growing up in the rural South, I'm going to assume that the reason the mother got to decide the name was because "Skylynn" and "Moises" sounded better than "Winnebago" and "Ford Ranger."

[keith]

I'm sure there are loads of exceptions to this, but this did have a ring of truth to it all the same.

Of course, the reason our first son is called Felix is because that's the only name we could both agree on! Hmph, I see Max (the name of our second) is in the list, but Bridget's background means Tennyson would have been a more likely choice. (Yeah, like I'd have agreed to that one... :-)

Anyway, the reasons were partly because they were both Roman emperors and because we liked names with x in them. Nothing to do with Felix the catfood brand, and we never knew that I'd end up working in Felix Dennis's publishing company! :-)

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