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An exploration of how baby names rise and fall

by Sarah Gilbert (Subscribe to Sarah Gilbert's posts)
Apr 13th 2005 6:22PM

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Filed under: Your Pregnancy, Media

its a baby - what is its name?

In Slate's treatise on baby names, I wasn't surprised to see that only one name has remained at the top of the popularity charts consisently over the past three decades: "Sarah." I should know, as others yell my name in the park, in the grocery store, at the doctor's office (there were three of us in the waiting room last week). And they don't mean me.

The data exposes a few myths. Celebrity names, they say, do not start naming trends, but rather follow them - Britney Spears' name was simply a follow-on to an already established trend. Instead, families are more likely to copy the names of a higher-income family the next street over. The pattern goes something like this: "Once a name catches on among high-income, highly educated parents, it starts working its way down the socioeconomic ladder." The author predicts that the names among the most educated parents will become the most popular names of 2015; for girls, names like Ansley, Ava, Clementine and Lara; for boys, names like Anderson, Carter, Liam and Sander. (I can testify to knowing three Liams, two Carters and a smattering of Avas). Link from mr. nice guy.

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