Bob Or Tim?
May 29th, 2007 by Andy |
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Look at the above image for a second and decide which guy is most likely named Bob, and which one is most likely named Tim. Did you choose? Ok, according to this article, a recent study from Miami University found a strong link between certain facial features and certain names. 100% of the students in one lecture hall identified the man on the left as Tim and the man on the right as a Bob, how did you do? There were several parts to the study, the first was to have participants use software to construct faces to match names they were given. The second group decided whether or not those faces matched the names they were created for. A third component proved that when a name matches a person’s expected features , it is easier to remember their name than if they differ. So the interesting thing is, how do people’s faces match their names if their parents didn’t know what they would look like when they were born! I’ve always thought that names and personalities somehow meshed, so this kind of proves that some aspect of that is true. Weird science! |
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May 29th, 2007 at 11:12 am
I think it has to do more with theater/film/television actually. On a daily basis, in the world of entertainment, we are presented with people named “Bob” and “Tim” who were picked for the role based on looking like a Bob or a Tim.
I think our expectations of what a Bob or a Tim look like are shaped primarily by what we see every day, and with your average American spending 4 hours a day watching TV, most of the Bobs and Tims they see were cast or named to fit an image.
Really interesting study.
Oh, and everyone in my office, myself included picked Tim for the man on the left and Bob for the man on the right.
June 2nd, 2008 at 3:41 pm
Andy, you’ve misunderstood the study somewhat (I am the “Tim” in the photo). The authors did not conclude that we actually look like our names (our names are not in fact Tim or Bob) but that people expect people with certain names to look certain ways. When they do, it is easier to remember their names then when they do not. Relative to the other photo, people expect my name to be Tim rather than Bob. Our parents, then, are not predicting anything when they choose our names.
Brendon