Posted on 08/12/2004 1:49:57 PM PDT by freedom44
Certain first names make people more attractive to the opposite sex while others are a turn-off, say linguists.
In an experiment, they found that pictures of men were rated as more appealing if they were called Ed, Matt or Mike than if their names were given as Paul, Sean or Roger.
The authors of the study claim the explanation lies in vowel sounds. Women prefer names with short vowels, such as e and i, produced at the front of the mouth.
However, the opposite is true for men. They prefer women's names with longer vowel sounds such as Laura, Moira or Paula.
The findings may help explain why some perfectly attractive people struggle to get dates.
Linguists have long argued whether arbitrary names given to people, objects and actions affect the way people think about them.
Amy Perfors, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, posted 24 pictures of her male and female friends on the website hotornot.com.
Visitors to the site are asked to rate the attractiveness of strangers on a scale of one to 10. More than 13 million pictures have been submitted and more than nine billion votes have been recorded.
Normally names are not included in the images. However Miss Perfors ensured that a first name appeared in the top corner of the picture.
Then she posted the same pictures under aliases to compare scores and found names that included vowel sounds produced at the front of the mouth, such as the short e and i, had greater sex appeal than names with fuller, longer sounds such as o and u.
According to the theory, names such as Rich, Nick, Lee, Elliot, Mike and Sam would do better than Tom, Roger, Sean, Mohammed, John, Raj and Rob.
The findings are published in New Scientist magazine today.
Max Powers: bump
Steel McReady bump.
This reminds me of the old 'Simpsons' episode where Homer changes his name to 'Max Power' and ends up hobnobbing with the liberal elite and the local celebrities, all because of his great name. When one of his new "beautiful people" friends compliments him on his cool name, Homer shrugs and replies, "I got it off a hair dryer."
"Women prefer names with short vowels, such as e and i, produced at the front of the mouth while the guy is licking his eyebrows"
hey, my name is Shawn.... but wait... im single :^)
ROFLMAO!!
YeAAAA!
There goes the plan to change my name to Mohammed...
Now I know why my perfect pick up line worked so well. "Ya, I'm rich".
"GOOD-BYE!"
thanks, bookmarking.
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