The Use of a Matching Preference Index to Empirically Examine Distribution Imbalances in Beijing Citizens’ Names
Personal names contain considerable meaningful information about biological and social characteristics of the name-bearer. They also routinely contain important data about cultural preferences in the naming process. Access to this level of information has been limited in the past by a lack of acces...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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University Library System, University of Pittsburgh
2021-08-01
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| Series: | Names |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://ans-names.pitt.edu/ans/article/view/2314 |
| _version_ | 1818174515903987712 |
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| author | Ziming Zhao Xiaomeng Li Qinghua Chen |
| author_facet | Ziming Zhao Xiaomeng Li Qinghua Chen |
| author_sort | Ziming Zhao |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description |
Personal names contain considerable meaningful information about biological and social characteristics of the name-bearer. They also routinely contain important data about cultural preferences in the naming process. Access to this level of information has been limited in the past by a lack of access to large-scale empirical data. As this investigation demonstrates, by utilizing a reliable large-scale sample of Beijing citizens, it is possible to empirically demonstrate onomastic imbalances in the occurrence of Chinese surnames, given names, and full names. In particular, this paper explores the matching imbalance between Chinese surnames and given names, a phenomenon which has as yet received scant attention in onomastic literature. As this article demonstrates, our innovative quantitative approach makes it possible to reveal statistically significant differences between real names and “random-matching names” that reflect a matching imbalance and imply the probable existence of underlying cultural preferences in Chinese naming processes. The key to this approach is generating a matching preference index (MPI) for names in a dataset. Alongside explaining how this approach is used, this paper offers possible reasons to explain why specific names have higher or lower MPI rankings. As this paper argues, one of the main reasons for these empirical differences may be found in special associations name-givers have within Chinese culture.
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| first_indexed | 2024-12-11T19:45:38Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-c7d5ba84cc4a4886ad3a21af91a180a2 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 0027-7738 1756-2279 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-11T19:45:38Z |
| publishDate | 2021-08-01 |
| publisher | University Library System, University of Pittsburgh |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Names |
| spelling | doaj.art-c7d5ba84cc4a4886ad3a21af91a180a22022-12-22T00:52:55ZengUniversity Library System, University of PittsburghNames0027-77381756-22792021-08-0169310.5195/names.2021.2314The Use of a Matching Preference Index to Empirically Examine Distribution Imbalances in Beijing Citizens’ NamesZiming Zhao0Xiaomeng Li1Qinghua Chen2Beijing Normal UniversityBeijing Normal UniversityBeijing Normal University Personal names contain considerable meaningful information about biological and social characteristics of the name-bearer. They also routinely contain important data about cultural preferences in the naming process. Access to this level of information has been limited in the past by a lack of access to large-scale empirical data. As this investigation demonstrates, by utilizing a reliable large-scale sample of Beijing citizens, it is possible to empirically demonstrate onomastic imbalances in the occurrence of Chinese surnames, given names, and full names. In particular, this paper explores the matching imbalance between Chinese surnames and given names, a phenomenon which has as yet received scant attention in onomastic literature. As this article demonstrates, our innovative quantitative approach makes it possible to reveal statistically significant differences between real names and “random-matching names” that reflect a matching imbalance and imply the probable existence of underlying cultural preferences in Chinese naming processes. The key to this approach is generating a matching preference index (MPI) for names in a dataset. Alongside explaining how this approach is used, this paper offers possible reasons to explain why specific names have higher or lower MPI rankings. As this paper argues, one of the main reasons for these empirical differences may be found in special associations name-givers have within Chinese culture. http://ans-names.pitt.edu/ans/article/view/2314Chinese namesrandom matchingZipf's Lawanthroponymy |
| spellingShingle | Ziming Zhao Xiaomeng Li Qinghua Chen The Use of a Matching Preference Index to Empirically Examine Distribution Imbalances in Beijing Citizens’ Names Names Chinese names random matching Zipf's Law anthroponymy |
| title | The Use of a Matching Preference Index to Empirically Examine Distribution Imbalances in Beijing Citizens’ Names |
| title_full | The Use of a Matching Preference Index to Empirically Examine Distribution Imbalances in Beijing Citizens’ Names |
| title_fullStr | The Use of a Matching Preference Index to Empirically Examine Distribution Imbalances in Beijing Citizens’ Names |
| title_full_unstemmed | The Use of a Matching Preference Index to Empirically Examine Distribution Imbalances in Beijing Citizens’ Names |
| title_short | The Use of a Matching Preference Index to Empirically Examine Distribution Imbalances in Beijing Citizens’ Names |
| title_sort | use of a matching preference index to empirically examine distribution imbalances in beijing citizens names |
| topic | Chinese names random matching Zipf's Law anthroponymy |
| url | http://ans-names.pitt.edu/ans/article/view/2314 |
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