Do you think certain types of people chose certain types of names?

[Jody R]

This is an odd one but I'm interested.

I used to date someone called Philip who had three brothers, Andrew, Christopher and Ian.

Now I am married to my Andrew (not my ex's brother) and one of his brothers is called Christopher Ian.

My ex's mother and my Mil are what I think of as a certain 'type' of person and between them they have used three names in common for their children.

I also went to school with brothers called Andrew, Christopher and Duncan so people who chose Christopher also seem to like Andrew.

I was curious if there are certain names that you would associate with certain types of people you know? Do certain groups of names go together more than others? Does anyone else know siblings from different families who have more than one name in common?

 

[crowned]

Yes! I know at least three different families who have both a David and a Jonathan. Also, I find a lot of people who have both a Jessica and a Jason in their families. Maybe it's partly a generational thing, though?

 

[Jody R]

It could be a generation thing.

My MiL is maybe five or six years younger than my ex's mum. By 'type' I mean that they have similar personality traits, both married young and had four children, similar appearences and creative hobbies.

I called my daughter Elisabeth Grace and realised that a woman I worked with a few years ago has a daughter called Grace Elizabeth. We were quite similar in lots of ways too but she is in my mums generation. I also know someone else who's daughter was Elizabeth Grace and someone with a Grace Elizabeth and again, we have lots of things in common.

It's just interesting to me that certain names seem to to go together even allowing for what is fashionable or popular at different times.

 

[DottyLottie]

I think you can categorise baby names by the typs of families they come from in some instances too.
Traditional names seem to be favoured by older, more traditional, often religious families for example.
Younger and working class families seem to favour new and trendy names where as the upper middle classes seem to choose semi-traditional or more unusual names with the lower middle classes choosing a concentration of popular top 100 names (fitting in or keeping up with the Jones's?).

I read a really interesting book about naming trends a couple of years ago, I wish I could remember who it was by as it gave a really detailed view of naming as social and generation trends.

 

[Jody R]

I think you can categorise baby names by the typs of families they come from in some instances too.
Traditional names seem to be favoured by older, more traditional, often religious families for example.
Younger and working class families seem to favour new and trendy names where as the upper middle classes seem to choose semi-traditional or more unusual names with the lower middle classes choosing a concentration of popular top 100 names (fitting in or keeping up with the Jones's?).

I read a really interesting book about naming trends a couple of years ago, I wish I could remember who it was by as it gave a really detailed view of naming as social and generation trends.

Freakonomics had a good view on social class naming trends, could it have been that?