Study: U.S. parents likely to name babies after new celebrities

Researchers have long found out that when choosing names for babies, what is popular and well-liked is what is used to christen them.

A new study by psychologists suggests that names given to babies by their parents in the U.S.A. are preferably taken from names of people who have recently gained fame and celebrity status, rather than those who have been popular for quite some time.

Researchers Todd Gureckis, an assistant professor of psychology at New York University, and Robert Goldstone, a professor of psychological and brain sciences at Indiana University, said in the journal Topics in Cognitive Science that the study is “relevant to understanding how people’s everyday decisions are influenced by aggregate cultural processes.”

The authors likened the trend of naming names to the stock market, saying:  “Parents in the United States are increasingly sensitive to the change in frequency of a name in recent time, such that names that are gaining in popularity are seen as more desirable than those that have fallen in popularity in the recent past.”

The research was supported by grants from the National Institute of Mental Health, in collaboration with the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation.

[via usatoday.com]