For over 25 years Human Inference has collected reference data, for instance on persons. Because of our reference set we immediately recognize that ‘Ask Me’ and ‘Any Body’ are fake names. People are using these either in test situations or to hide their actual names.

In the old days we only needed to test on ‘Test Test’, in more recent years we see great inventiveness on these fake names. A brief example can be seen in the following list.

In case you cannot rely on reference data and interpretation you need to provide a check list. Providing it is one thing, but since users tend to be really creative, maintaining it is essential.

In these 25 years we identified a move from ‘real fake names’ towards ‘real names used in a fake way’. In the USA, for example, we identified popular Hollywood names and names of politicians being used as fake names. Currently the usage of the name ‘George Bush’ is decreasing, whereas ‘Barack Obama’ is increasingly used. We recognize the false usage of these names because of the change in frequency figures of the given name and family name as well as the usage of the combination itself. Remarkable is that ‘Abraham Lincoln’ and ‘George Washington’ are quite steady.

Back to ‘Walter von Stolzing’. By now you might have guessed what is happening here. We recognized that in German speaking areas this name is also passing our threshold on validity. By googling the name you can see that Walter is actually a character in Wagner’s opera ‘Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg’ back from 1868!

Let’s see if in 100 years time people are still using ‘Darth Vader’, ‘Lord Rings’ or ‘Snoop Dogg’!

All the names used in this blog are ‘real’ names coming from a popular social media site. Please check our cleansing products in case you need cleansing solutions.

Your parents probably gave a lot of thought to the name they once gave you, and as it turns out they were right to do so! Research tells us a name can do wonders for its owner, as well as a lot of damage for that matter. Let’s have a look at some remarkable results.

Peter for President!
Recent studies show that in the US a student called Fred is more likely to fail his exam than a student who just happened to be named Andrew: people tend to indentify with their name and, in general, have a positive feeling about letters that correspond with their initials. Consequently Fred is far more likely to settle for a meager F, while Andrew will have an extra motive to strive for an A. It also explains how in choosing a partner we show a slight preference for someone whose name resembles our own, or why Mary will prefer to live in Maryland, while Monica is more inclined to settle in Santa Monica. Most of these preferences only show themselves through our subliminal selves, so we are not actually aware of the motivation for some of our choises. Another US study endorses these findings: inspired by the results mentioned above, researchers decided they’d investigate on another letter. They came up with the letter K, which in baseball stands for strikeout. The study showed once again that there is a connection between a letter and its causer: batters whose names began with a K struck out more often than other batters.

Ominous names
A UK research tells us that as much as one in 5 parents regret how they named their child. The novelty might have worn off after a few years, but can there be any real objections to a certain name? Apparently, there are plenty! Ironically it’s not the parents who’ll have to carry this burden for the rest of their lives…

“Hi, I’m Antwan, but you can call me Antoine…”
It seems that even children’s language skills are influenced by their name. This has to do with the effect negative emotions can have on a child’s performance. If for example you decided to name your son ‘Gene’ but spell it ‘Jene’, he is very likely to get confronted with disbelief from his teachers. “Are you sure your name isn’t spelled with a ‘G’?” This can severely undermine Jene’s sense of confidence. That explains why children with an unusual name or a name that is unusually spelled generally are less adequate spellers and readers.

“But Sissi is a Royal name, dear!”
When a girl is called Frankie we think it’s a fun name, a cool and robust statement to fit a strong personality. Yet when a boy is called Mckenzie, (yes, some parents think it’s cute to give their boy a name that has a feminine touch to it ) we see a similar effect, but with a different outcome. This is something his parents obviously had not foreseen: their son will constantly be shaking off his girly image. The effect is striking: boys with a androgynous name misbehave more often than their unambiguously named peers, especially when they reach puberty. A boy called Mckenzie or Aubrey is even more likely to display bad behaviour when there is a girl with the same name among his peers. One more reason for parents to stick to conventions when choosing a name for their newborn.

Want to produce the new Einstein? Call her Kate!
A name can be a burden, but if you use this knowledge wisely, you might just turn it into an advantage. What happens to a girl when she has finished school and needs to choose what subject to study? Well, according to a US study, her choice depends on her name. As it turns out girls with a very feminine name like Julietta or Isabella are more likely to study humanities, while those whose name is less obviously feminine are more partial towards science. The question is: who’s aspiring to whom? Could it be that parents would treat Kate in a different way than Barbara? Or did the parents subconciously decide they wanted to raise a scientist when they decided to call their daughter Kate?

Would you rather hire Vanity or Grace?
Of course it’s not just letters or gender that determines how we feel about a name. In fact, how other people perceive us very much depends on the meaning of our name. For example: when looking for a new member on your marketing team, would you rather hire Vanity or Grace? In spite of what her name tells us, Grace might be a job jumper who doesn’t know how to work in unison with her colleagues. Vanity on the other hand could just be a daughter of a well-read mother who had just finished her latest Thackeray when she gave birth. Still, both women will either meet a lot of prejudice or feel the need to live up to a very high standard because of their name.

It all goes to show that a name defenitely posesses some self-fulfilling qualities. Given the fact that so many parents regret their choice of names afterwards makes me think that the owners of that name might share these sentiments. So what does that mean when looking at it from a data quality point of view? Unisex names for example are responsible for a lot of data quality issues. As the borders between male and female names are fading we’ll need to update our knowledge continually. The human in Human Inference will definitely take care of that. After all, we wouldn’t want to you to put off Mrs Clinton when sending her a petition to take pity on the Syrian citizens starting: “Dear Mr. Clinton…”.

Source: Livescience.com & Babynames.com

It becomes more challenging if there is no longer a link between nickname and official name. That may happen, for example, if people move from one cultural region to another where also other writing sets are used. Take for example my chinese friend 高为民, whose Latin name would be Gao Weimin (family name first), but the moment he works in Europe or the US he is using the Latin variant William Gao. There is no common relation to the name William and Weimin both in Latin or Chinese and it they are no phonetic variants of each other.

Recently, I have read a very impressive book from Dave Eggers, called `What is the What´. It gives you a good insight in one of the current problem areas of the world and how people try to survive there. Achak Denk is one of the so-called Lost Boys from Sudan. During his live in Sudan, in refugee camps and finally in the US he is officially using differnt names. That has nothing to do with purposely trying to mystify his identity, but more with receiving an identity from your environment – at that time and place. He is born as Achak, baptized as Valentino, and later on using the name Dominic or Dominic Arou and Marialdit. Of course there are people calling him nick names as ‘Sleeper’ or ‘Gone Far’ but at certain periods in his life he is officially using completely different names. This makes automatic matching of persons, or even manual matching, challenging and keeps it interresting.

I would recommend the book to everyone who wants to learn about what is happening in our world, and especially those interested in names (don’t forget to study all the names in the last Section of the book).