相关论文: Cross correlations of the American baby names

In social sciences, there is currently no consensus on the mechanism for cultural evolution. The evolution of first names of newborn babies offers a remarkable example for the researches in the field. Here we perform statistical analyses on…

We report investigations on the statistical characteristics of the baby names given between 1910 and 2010 in the United States of America. For each year, the 100 most frequent names in the USA are sorted out. For these names, the…

An individual's identity in a human society is specified by his or her name. Differently from family names, usually inherited from fathers, a given name for a child is often chosen at the parents' disposal. However, their decision cannot be…

The study of cultural evolution seeks to understand the processes by which behavioral variants are chosen in cultures over time, often as the result of large numbers of individual human choices. The selection of new popes, each of whom…

We analyze the social mechanisms that shape the popularity rise and fall of the names given to newborn babies. During the initial stage, popularity increases by imitation. As the people with the same name grow in number, however, its usage…

A stochastic model for the evolution of a growing population is proposed, in order to explain empirical power-law distributions in the frequency of family names as a function of the family size. Preliminary results show that the predicted…

Cultural traits such as words, names, decorative styles, and technical standards often assume arbitrary values and are thought to evolve neutrally. But neutral evolution cannot explain why some traits come and go in cycles of popularity…

Neutral evolution assumes that there are no selective forces distinguishing different variants in a population. Despite this striking assumption, many recent studies have sought to assess whether neutrality can provide a good description of…

We analyze the dynamic properties of 10^7 words recorded in English, Spanish and Hebrew over the period 1800--2008 in order to gain insight into the coevolution of language and culture. We report language independent patterns useful as…

Although cumulative family name distributions in many countries exhibit power-law forms, there also exist counterexamples. The origin of different family name distributions across countries is discussed analytically in the framework of a…

In modern societies, cultural change seems ceaseless. The flux of fashion is especially obvious for popular music. While much has been written about the origin and evolution of pop, most claims about its history are anecdotal rather than…

We consider a Moran-type model of cultural evolution, which describes how traits emerge, are transmitted, and get lost in populations. Our analysis focuses on the underlying cultural genealogies; they were first described by Aguilar and…

We examine the problem of family size statistics (the number of individuals carrying the same surname, or the same DNA sequence) in a given size subsample of an exponentially growing population. We approach the problem from two directions.…

A quantitative understanding of cities' demographic dynamics is becoming a potentially useful tool for planning sustainable growth. The concomitant theory should reveal details of the cities' past and also of its interaction with nearby…

Surnames and nonrecombining alleles are inherited from a single parent in a highly similar way. A simple birth-death model with mutations can accurately describe this process. Exponentially growing and constant populations are investigated,…

Recent studies of gender bias in computing use large datasets involving automatic predictions of gender to analyze computing publications, conferences, and other key populations. Gender bias is partly defined by software-driven algorithmic…

We examine the complete dataset of baby name popularity collected by U.S. Social Security Administration for the last 131 years (1880-2010). The ranked baby name popularity can be fitted empirically by a piecewise function consisting of…

Evolution has fascinated quantitative and physical scientists for decades: how can the random process of mutation, recombination, and duplication of genetic information generate the diversity of life? What determines the rate of evolution?…

Anthropometric measurements such as weight, stature (height), and body mass index (BMI) provide reliable indicators of children's growth. The 2000 CDC growth charts are the national standards in the United States for these important…

Simulations of the Simmel effect are performed for agents in a scale-free social network. The social hierarchy of an agent is determined by the degree of her node. Particular features, once selected by a highly connected agent, became…