London: Parents are being warned to think long and hard when choosing names for their babies as research has discovered that girls who are given very feminine names such as Anna, Emma or Elizabeth are less likely to study Maths or Physics after the age of 16, a remarkable study has found.

Both subjects, which are traditionally seen as predominantly male, are far more popular among girls with names such as Abigail, Lauren and Ashley, which have been judged as less feminine in a linguistic test. The effect is so strong that parents can set twin daughters off on completely different career paths simply by calling them Isabella and Alex, names at either end of the spectrum. A study of 1,000 pairs of sisters in the U.S. found that Alex was twice as likely as her twin to take Maths or Science at a higher level.

Part of the reason is that names provide a powerful image of a person and influence people's reactions to them. An Isabella is less likely to study Maths, according to the theory, because people would not expect her to.

"There are plenty of exceptions but, on average, people treat Isabellas differently to Alexes," said David Figlio, professor of economics at the University of Florida and author of the report. "Girls with feminine names were often typecast."

Stereotype

Mr. Figlio pointed to the controversy that arose over the first talking Barbie's phrase, `Maths is hard'. "It is a stereotype, and girls with particularly feminine names may feel more pressure to avoid technical subjects," he said.

Not that they were any less capable. When the Isabellas, Annas and Elizabeths took on their tougher-named peers in science, they performed just as well.

To carry out the study, to be published in the Journal of Human Resources, Mr. Figlio calculated a linguistic `femininity' score for each name. It was arrived at by using 1,700 letter and sound combinations that could be associated as either female or male and matching them against the names on 1.4 million birth certificates.

He also showed how harmful giving your child a `chav' or lower-status name could be. In a study of 55,000 children, the exam marks of those with `lower-status' names — often spelled in an unusual way or including punctuation — were on average 3 to 5 percentage points lower than siblings with more traditional names. One of the reasons was that teachers had lower expectations of them.

In his book Baby Name Report Card, UCLA psychology professor Albert Mehrabian tested a host of names to see how attractive people found them. Some names immediately aroused images of success, others of popularity or kindness. On the whole, people judged to have more traditional names such as Rachel and Robert did extremely well. More alternative names scored badly.

Awareness

Mr. Figlio argued that people should be more aware of the power of names. "In ways we are only beginning to understand, children with different names but the exact same upbringing grow up to have remarkably different life outcomes," he said.

— © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006

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