Pop culture baby name game results, 2015

Here are the results of Pop Culture Baby Name Game 2015!

Quick disclaimer: Some of these names were already on the rise. Others were likely influenced by multiple pop culture events/people (not just the one listed). So I leave it up to you to judge the degree/nature of pop culture influence for yourself.

Adaline, +737 [ranked 11th on the list of raw-number increases for girl names]

  • Up from 164 baby girls in 2014 to 901 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the movie The Age of Adaline (2015).

Abel, +659 [ranked 12th on the list of raw-number increases for boy names]

  • Up from 2,557 baby boys in 2014 to 3,216 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: singer Abel Makkonen Tesfaye (stage name The Weeknd).

Finn, +301 [ranked 47th on the list of raw-number increases for boy names]

  • Up from 1,580 baby boys in 2014 to 1,881 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the movie Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015).

Taya, +180

  • Up from 93 baby girls in 2014 to 273 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the movie American Sniper (2014).

Lucille, +142

  • Up from 970 baby girls in 2014 to 1,112 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the death of B. B. King (whose guitars were all called “Lucille”).

Margot, +126

  • Up from 377 baby girls in 2014 to 503 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: actress Margot Robbie.

Atticus, +106

  • Up from 852 baby boys in 2014 to 958 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the book Go Set a Watchman (2015).

Canaan, +104

  • Up from 179 baby girls in 2014 to 283 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the news of Oprah Winfrey’s son, Canaan.

Hakeem, +87

  • Up from 72 baby boys in 2014 to 159 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the TV show Empire (2015-).

Annalise, +78

  • Up from 699 baby boys in 2014 to 777 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the TV show How to Get Away with Murder (2014-).

Lola, +57

  • Up from 1,386 baby girls in 2014 to 1,443 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the TV show Empire (2015-).

Arlo, +54

  • Up from 518 baby boys in 2014 to 572 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the movie The Good Dinosaur (2015).

Carter, +53

  • Up from 10,674 baby boys in 2014 to 10,727 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: unsure (suggested in the comments).

Carli, +36

  • Up from 110 baby girls in 2014 to 146 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: soccer player Carli Lloyd.

Margo, +36

  • Up from 152 baby girls in 2014 to 188 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the movie Paper Towns (2015). Or, of course, Margot Robbie.

Bjorn, +35

  • Up from 63 baby boys in 2014 to 98 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the TV show Vikings.

Roland, +32

  • Up from 437 baby boys in 2014 to 469 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the movie By The Sea (2015).

Taraji, +30

  • Up from 200 baby girls in 2014 to 230 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the TV show Empire (2015-).

Adonis, +29

  • Up from 327 baby boys in 2014 to 356 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the movie Creed (2015).

Sullivan (as a boy name), +29

  • Up from 631 baby boys in 2014 to 660 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: actor Sullivan Stapleton.

Joy, +28

  • Up from 692 baby girls in 2014 to 720 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the movie Inside Out (2015).

Kylo, +27

  • Up from 8 baby boys in 2014 to 35 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the movie Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015).

Alex (as a girl name), +25

  • Up from 160 baby girls in 2014 to 185 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: soccer player Alex Morgan.

Rebel, +25 (as a girl name), -3 (as a boy name)

  • Up from 58 baby girls in 2014 to 83 in 2015.
  • Down from 48 baby boys in 2014 to 45 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the Confederate flag debate.
  • Update, 5/12/16: The state-by-state data was just released. Of the 83 baby girls named Rebel, 12 were born in Texas, 9 in California, 8 in Arkansas and 6 in Oklahoma. Of the 45 boys, 7 were born in Texas and 5 in Tennessee.

Meghan, +24

  • Up from 214 baby girls in 2014 to 238 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: soccer player Meghan Klingenberg.

Lucious, +18

  • Up from 19 baby boys in 2014 to 37 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the TV show Empire (2015-).

Christie, +15

  • Up from 31 baby girls in 2014 to 46 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: soccer player Christie Rampone.

Tobin (as a girl name), re-entered with 14

  • After an absence, returned to the list with 14 baby girls.
  • Pop culture influence: soccer player Tobin Heath.

Alessia, +13

  • Up from 200 baby girls in 2014 to 213 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: singer Alessia Cara.

Lyon, +13

  • Up from 29 baby boys in 2014 to 42 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the TV show Empire (2015-).

Kelsea, +12

  • Up from 35 baby girls in 2014 to 47 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: country singer Kelsea Ballerini.

Gigi, +11

  • Up from 27 baby girls in 2014 to 38 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: model Gigi Hadid.

Ragnar, +11

  • Up from 19 baby boys in 2014 to 30 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the TV show Vikings.

Rollo, re-entered with 10

  • After an absence, returned to the list with 10 baby boys.
  • Pop culture influence: the TV show Vikings.

Max (as a girl name), +9

  • Up from 14 baby girls in 2014 to 23 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: Maxima “Max” Chan Zuckerberg, daughter of Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan.

Poe, re-entered with 9

  • After an absence, returned to the list with 9 baby boys.
  • Pop culture influence: the movie Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015).

Denali, +8 (as a boy name) and +7 (as a girl name)

  • Up from 20 baby boys in 2014 to 28 in 2015.
  • Up from 55 baby girls in 2014 to 62 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the renaming of Denali.

Bindi, re-entered with 8

  • After an absence, returned to the list with 8 baby girls.
  • Pop culture influence: Dancing with the Stars contestant Bindi Irwin.

Eilis, re-entered with 6

  • After an absence, returned to the list with 6 baby girls.
  • Pop culture influence: the movie Brooklyn (2015).

Trai, re-entered with 6

  • After an absence, returned to the list with 6 baby boys.
  • Pop culture influence: the TV show Empire (2015-).

Becky, +5

  • Up from 53 baby girls in 2014 to 58 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: soccer player Becky Sauerbrunn.

Bernie, +5

  • Up from 6 baby boys in 2014 to 11 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: presidential candidate Bernie Sanders.

Saint, +5

  • Up from 32 baby boys in 2014 to 37 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: Saint West, son of Kanye West and Kim Kardashian.

Serra, +5

  • Up from 12 baby girls in 2014 to 17 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: the canonization of Junipero Serra.

Taron, +4

  • Up from 31 baby boys in 2014 to 35 in 2015.
  • Pop culture influence: actor Taron Egerton.

Names that went down:

Names not on the SSA’s list in 2015:

  • Aslaug
  • Bryshere
  • Cookie
  • Dameron
  • DuVernay
  • Empire
  • Furiosa
  • Halsey
  • Jeralean
  • Junipero
  • Jussie
  • Lagertha
  • Rey (as a girl name)
  • Sonoya
  • Trump

Did any of these surprise you?

P.S. Some of the names from the 2014 game that have started/continued to do well: Hazel, Amal, Tauriel, and Wyatt (as a girl name). Elsa and Anna, on the other hand, both saw drops in usage.

26 thoughts on “Pop culture baby name game results, 2015

  1. Becky may have been influenced by Empire as well. Also, there is not a Trai on Empire so I am not sure how the show influenced the name.

  2. Meghan could also be influenced by Meghan Trainor, that seems more likely the influence to me since she’s pretty big right now. And Becky could have the influence of Becky G as well (She was on empire, but in terms of chart success she was bigger in 2014).

  3. Another big winner I found looking through the data was Royalty which rose 155 births possibly due to Chris Brown’s daughter (it’s never jumped that much before). It’s the name of Chris Brown’s new album too so I’d expect it to jump next year as well.

  4. Today I had the time to take a first glance at the new SSA data. For me, the biggest surprise is the increase of the two names Marx and Lenin (both reaching a new record of baby boys in one year).

  5. My first nomination for the 2016 game:

    Bernie (for Bernie Sanders, of course)

  6. @elbowin – Just added Bernie and Prince to next year’s post, thanks!

    And, speaking of Prince, I gotta throw in Paisley for Paisley Park. (Though the name Paisley is bounding up the charts right now, so it’ll be hard to discern what kind of influence Prince has on it, if any.)

    That is extremely interesting about Marx and Lenin! I hadn’t seen that yet. Here are links to the graphs:

    • Marx – doubled from 8 to 16 baby boys (7 of them in CA specifically)
    • Lenin – nearly doubled from 36 to 66 baby boys (12 in CA, 12 in TX)

    I can’t think of a cause off the top of my head. Can anyone else?

  7. Here’s my next nomination: Ingwen

    For the new president of Taiwan, Tsai Ing-wen

    The name looks as if it was made of European name elements: The Germanic ING of Ingrid and the Wlsh/Fantasy WEN of Arwen; this can add to its appeal.

  8. I was surprised about Hamilton as well.

    Then again, I’m not sure how well-known it was (by the general public) through most of 2015 — so the timing might have been a factor. I definitely expect usage to rise in 2016, though.

  9. The next suggestion for 2016:

    Rykiel

    for the late fashion designer Sonia Rykiel. Rykiel was (unlike other fashion related names) never on the SSA stats.

  10. Next nomination:

    Esperanto

    The international auxilliary langue was named after the pseudonym of its inventor, Dr. Esperanto (.i.e. L. L. Zamenhof). The pop cultural influence is the fact, that there are now over 500000 (half a million!) people learning Esperanto from English on the duolingo language learning platform.

    Esperanto never occurred as a given name in the SSA stats yet.

  11. I might as well join in and nominate: Wilder (for Gene Wilder).

    As you may know, he passed away yesterday (at least where I’m from as of the time of writing this comment) and, like the last mentioned actor that influenced a specific name’s usage (Robin Williams), he was known for his portrayals in films such as Young Frankenstein and Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory. His surname, as a given name, is already increasing in usage but I think the death of this very well-known actor might add an extra layer to this preppy hell-raiser appeal that draws expectant parents and name nerds to Wilder.

  12. First ladies and presidential daughters tend to make some jumps in the stats, so I predict a spike on the names

    Melania, Ivanka, and Tiffany.

  13. Thinking of interesting names that could rise due to Leonard Cohen …

    Jikan (his name as a Buddhist monk)
    Lorca (his daughter’s given name)

  14. Here’s one from 2015 that we missed: Aylan, for Aylan Kurdi, the 3-year-old Syrian boy who drowned in September. (Some outlets now say his name was Alan Shenu.)

    Usage of the name Aylan more than quintupled from 2014 to 2015:

    2015: 64 baby boys named Aylan
    2014: 12 baby boys named Aylan
    2013: 7 baby boys named Aylan

  15. Cohen is already rising exponentially since 2004 (what happened than?), but maybe

    Leonhard

    is also a good candidate to watch.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.