Why do names become popular

The average first-time mum today was born in the late '80s, "and in class in school they would have had a lot of Matthews, Chrises, Daniels, Samanthas, Jessicas," Ms Linco says.

Popular boys' names have always been more commonly used than popular girls' names — and therefore more densely concentrated — than popular girls' names.

That's partly because parents traditionally opted for more conservative, "business-friendly" names for their sons, Dr Woodman speculates. Today, as gender roles and the working world changes, it's possible those restrictions are freeing up. Parents of girls, in particular, are increasingly choosing names that push gender boundaries, sometimes consciously opting for traditionally masculine names with leadership or strength-related meanings.

Girls' names remain more inventive than boys' names today — the top girls' names were given to significantly fewer babies than the top boys' names in , Ms Linco points out. But overall, parents are being more inventive in naming both sons and daughters than they were in the past. ABC Everyday helps you navigate life's challenges and choices so you can stay on top of the things that matter to you.

We acknowledge Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the First Australians and Traditional Custodians of the lands where we live, learn and work. ABC Everyday. Print content Print with images and other media. Print text only. Print Cancel. Fewer babies given 'top names' compared to previous generations. Varnum points to studies showing that wealthier people tend to be more self-focused and to prefer uniqueness over conformity. He thinks this may have made sense in our evolution.

Another recent study examined naming practices in the United States from to and found more evidence consistent with this theory. Emily Bianchi at Emory University found an increase in common names was correlated with lower unemployment rates on both a national and state level.

The simple fact of your name may alter your chances of entering professions such as medicine or the law Credit: Alamy. Given the importance of our name in forging our identity, could these choices change your path in life. There is now some evidence this may be the case.

One study indicated that names that are easier-to-pronounce are judged more positively and were correlated to higher positions at law firms.

Your name can even affect your romantic prospects. Another study found for example that people with less-common names were more likely to be neglected by visitors on an online dating site.

There is also a growing tendency to pick names that blur gender boundaries, and in , David Figlio, the director of the Institute for Policy Research at Northwestern University analysed pairs of sisters to determine how this might influence their chosen area of study. He first analysed thousands of names to determine the likelihood certain phonemes and structures will be given to boys and girls.

For example, while the name Ann is almost always likely to be given to a girl, the spelling Anne, is even more linguistically feminine. The effect might carry on into adulthood. Another study showed that women with names that are more linguistically masculine were more likely to have successful careers as lawyers.

For boys it may be a different story. Figlio found for example, that having middle-school-aged boys with names that are traditionally given to girls in class led to higher rates of disruption, particularly if there was a girl in the class with the same name. In some countries including Wales courts have ruled against parents' choice of name for their child Credit: Alamy. Meanwhile, if you look much further down the charts, you can see a bunch of newer, dark-horse names that are gradually gaining in popularity.

They rise in popularity, enjoy a period of dominance, and then fall. Social scientists and historians have been puzzling over this for decades, and the short-but-unsatisfying answer is that no-one truly knows. But there are some intriguing clues! One obvious one is the influence of pop culture. Parents get name ideas from everything from their favorite celebrities to characters in bestselling books. Even some more-unconventional names saw a surge in the wake of a hit song.

But after songs with those names became hummable hits in the 60s and 70s, they all suddenly debuted on the top baby-name charts. Success was fleeting, though. As Napierski-Prancl found, the popularity of the name generally faded soon after the song itself left the charts.

That said, the power of pop music had its limits. As Schlesinger notes:. After General Richard Montgomery was killed in the Battle of Quebec, American parents swooned over the tale and, it appears, his name.

Politics can have even subtler effects on the naming of children, it turns out. A pair of psychologists noted the long-held stereotype of Western Americans being highly independent, and wondered if it had any effect on baby naming. Sure enough, they found that parents in Northwestern states like Montana, Washington, Oregon, Idaho and Wyoming were the least likely in the country to pick popular baby names.

Yet there was an interesting wrinkle: The Republican parents were more likely to pick the name if they lived in a district that was purple, and contained Democrats. One intriguing, nation-wide trend in baby names? Over the last years, Americans have increasingly embraced novelty. In other words, more kids were getting names that would have been considered unusual or new. And the trend is more prominent for girls than boys: Americans are more willing to experiment with new names for girls, it seems, than for boys.

As Matthew W. Hahn and Alexander Bentley found , the incidence of new, unusual names rose in the 20s, peaked around , but then plummeted in the 40s and 50s.