Comments on: Hilary: the most poisoned baby name in US history

By: hilaryparker

hilaryparker — Mon, 15 Apr 2013 01:12:03 +0000

No problem! You totally caught me in my most hand-wavey moment. Yes, me omitting the names for the 1800s because there was a smaller population does sort of defeat the purpose of using the relative risk in theory. But at the same time, with very low population numbers the variance of the relative risk increases. If you look at the graphs you can see this — you can’t really identify where the 67-69% drops are on the “Clementine”, “Minna” and “Celestine” graphs because drops that big weren’t really out of the ordinary (because of the higher variance, i.e. the lines look equally noisy throughout). However with the larger population numbers, the relative risk is more stable year to year because there is decreased variance. So a drop of 70% is much more noticeable in the “Hilary” graph than the “Clementine” one.

In an official analysis we might determine a sample size cutoff or actually estimate the variance in order to determine “fair” comparisons. In this case I just figured hand-waving was best. It’s a great trick in the statistical toolbox, and one I chose to use because even without the handwaving, “Hilary” still wins .

By: Godwin

Godwin — Sun, 14 Apr 2013 23:42:48 +0000

Hi, I have a question about one of your steps. When you decided to omit the names from the late 1800s because there was a smaller population doesn’t that defeat the purpose of using the relative risk ratio? But If what you’re saying is true, that it was easier for a name to drop in popularity because there were fewer people, wouldn’t it be necessary to compare the RR ratio for a name at a given year to the averaged rate of all girl names that declined in that year? E.g. the likelihood of Randi declining from 1982 to 1983 is 16% but if the average of all female names that faced a popularity decline from 1982 to 1983 was 33%. Even if Randi does show such a pretty big decline during that year isn’t that more popular than a name that drops 5% compared to a population mean of .5% for all popularity drops for a given year? I’m not being patronizing btw, I genuinely don’t know if I’m even in the right ballpark with this question. Thanks!

By: The Demise of the Baby Name Hillary - Nancy's Baby Names - Baby name blog featuring girl names, boy names, rare baby names, popular baby names, baby name popularity graphs, baby name meanings, and more.

Thu, 04 Apr 2013 09:00:53 +0000

[...] Parker’s recent post on the 14 most “poisoned” baby names reminded me that I haven’t yet written about the demise of the baby name Hillary. (Or Hilary. [...]

By: Hilary，你的名字弱爆了！ - 逆袭网 | 逆袭网

Hilary，你的名字弱爆了！ - 逆袭网 | 逆袭网 — Fri, 22 Feb 2013 13:41:48 +0000

[...] Hilary，你的名字弱爆了！一位叫Hilary的研究生分析了近百年来比较受欢迎的美国人名，发现美国人取名虽然喜欢追星，但是却对Hilary这个名字避之不及。想知道原因？看图就明白！ [...]

By: GOP’s Foreign Policy Unfit for a World Power | Thought FTW

GOP’s Foreign Policy Unfit for a World Power | Thought FTW — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 18:02:24 +0000

[...] Hilary: The Most Poisoned Baby Name in US History The root word for Hilary is the Latin word “hilarius” meaning cheerful and merry, which is the same root word for “hilarious” and “exhilarating.” It’s a great name. [...]

By: Données fleuries #1 | Data Bloom

Données fleuries #1 | Data Bloom — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 16:42:00 +0000

[...] prénoms les plus empoisonnés de l’histoire des Etats-Unis » (original, via), revisite – avec l’aide d’un bon gros scraping des familles et du logiciel [...]

By: Conuly

Conuly — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 02:19:07 +0000

Adolf and Adolph did decline in popularity in the US during and after the Second World War. However, they had already been in decline prior to the war starting, as were other German names. Given that German immigration to America was slowing, this isn’t very surprising.

By: The Rise and Fall of “Hilary” and Hillary » Sociological Images

The Rise and Fall of “Hilary” and Hillary » Sociological Images — Tue, 05 Feb 2013 16:31:04 +0000

[...] of what to name the baby (see this earlier post on “Twilight” names). But Hilary Parker points out some examples where celebrity influence is unmistakable. Like [...]

By: Anna Powell-Smith

Anna Powell-Smith — Mon, 04 Feb 2013 12:23:17 +0000

Hey Hilary, fascinating write-up!

A while back, I did some analysis of the UK baby name data, which we have back to 1996: http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2012/apr/25/baby-names-data

Just as you find with Hilary/Hillary in the US, in the UK there’s a rapid dip in the name “Cherie” in the years after Tony Blair became prime minister in 1997 – Cherie Blair is his wife, and she was also attacked a lot by the press, for having the temerity to be a successful lawyer.

I build an interactive tool for searching the UK data, you can see the dip in Cherie here:

http://names.darkgreener.com/#cherie

It’s depressing, frankly.

I didn’t do an analysis of the biggest one-year drops, but I did look at the biggest proportional falls from 1996-2010 overall, using the same method as you. I found that the girls’ names in the UK with the biggest drops in the period were: Brittany, Jordan, Courteney, Lauryn and Kirby. (I can see what’s going on with all those except Kirby.)

By: Br3nda

Br3nda — Mon, 04 Feb 2013 01:30:54 +0000

Many many women’s names begin as men’s names. it being cultural acceptable to give a masculine name to girls, but almost never a feminine name to boy. it’s very hard to find a name that went from being women’s name to a men’s name