英文名有讲究：哪些很man哪些很小女人

 　　There are a lot of factors that go into choosing a baby name. It could be a fandom thing, such as with the babies named Anakin or the children named after Game of Thrones characters.

　　给小宝宝起名字有诸多影响因素。给孩子取名阿纳金(天行者，《星球大战》中重要人物)或者根据《权力的游戏》来取名是粉丝可能会做的事情。

　　But it could be also simply be the way it sounds. According to a new study published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology¹, people tend to assign certain names to boys and others to girls based on the first phoneme.

　　但有时候可能仅仅因为发音关系，《性格与社会心理学杂志》发表的一项新研究称，根据头一个音素，人们倾向于给男孩子取有些特定的名字，而给女孩子取其它一些特定的名字。

　　The researchers analyzed² 270 million recorded baby names in the US from 1937 and 2013 and found that names typically assigned to boys were voiced and began with a “hard” phoneme, or one that vibrated the vocal³ cords, while girls had “softer” names.

　　研究人员分析了美国自1937年至2013年2.7亿记录在册的婴儿名字，发觉分给男孩子的名字通常是浊音发音，开头音素”有力“，或者需要震动声带。而女孩子的名字则”更加轻柔”。

　　To judge the difference for yourself, say your name and see if the first sound is made purely⁴ with your tongue and lips (so a “soft” name) or if you use your throat.

　　要亲自作鉴别，说说自己的名字，看看第一个音是不是单纯靠舌头和嘴唇发出的(这就是“柔和”的名字)，还是说需要用喉咙。

　　Of course, this study isn’t the end of all conversations about names and gender⁵, especially considering how gender can’t be simplified between just two ends of a spectrum⁶. It’s also not a definite identifier of gender, as there are many names that are typically assigned to girls that start with that hard phoneme, such as Jessica, Yvonne, and Ariel.

　　当然，这一研究并不能对名字和性别一概而论，尤其考虑到性别并不能分化成两极来谈。这同样也不能以此绝对判断性别，因为有些典型的女孩子名字开头音素就颇有力道，如Jessica、Yvonne还有Ariel。

　　The study provides more insight into how we perceive sounds and the relationships between those sounds and meaning. Why do we find certain words repulsive⁷? Why do others sound moreapproachable? These are questions that can crack open a language and a culture.

　　这项研究深入研究了我们是如何洞察声音的、如何看待声音和意义之间的联系的。缘何我们对有些特定的词反感，又觉得有些声音特别亲切?这些问题可以打开语言和文化的大门。

 

1 psychology   

n.心理，心理学，心理状态

参考例句：

• She has a background in child psychology.她受过儿童心理学的教育。
• He studied philosophy and psychology at Cambridge.他在剑桥大学学习哲学和心理学。

2 analyzed   

v.分析( analyze的过去式和过去分词 )；分解；解释；对…进行心理分析

参考例句：

• The doctors analyzed the blood sample for anemia. 医生们分析了贫血的血样。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The young man did not analyze the process of his captivation and enrapturement, for love to him was a mystery and could not be analyzed. 这年轻人没有分析自己蛊惑著迷的过程，因为对他来说，爱是个不可分析的迷。 来自《简明英汉词典》

3 vocal   

adj.直言不讳的；嗓音的；n.[pl.]声乐节目

参考例句：

• The tongue is a vocal organ.舌头是一个发音器官。
• Public opinion at last became vocal.终于舆论哗然。

4 purely   

adv.纯粹地，完全地

参考例句：

• I helped him purely and simply out of friendship.我帮他纯粹是出于友情。
• This disproves the theory that children are purely imitative.这证明认为儿童只会单纯地模仿的理论是站不住脚的。

5 gender   

n.（生理上的）性，（名词、代词等的）性

参考例句：

• French differs from English in having gender for all nouns.法语不同于英语，所有的名词都有性。
• Women are sometimes denied opportunities solely because of their gender.妇女有时仅仅因为性别而无法获得种种机会。

6 spectrum   

n.谱，光谱，频谱；范围，幅度，系列

参考例句：

• This is a kind of atomic spectrum.这是一种原子光谱。
• We have known much of the constitution of the solar spectrum.关于太阳光谱的构成，我们已了解不少。

7 repulsive   

adj.排斥的，使人反感的

参考例句：

• She found the idea deeply repulsive.她发现这个想法很恶心。
• The repulsive force within the nucleus is enormous.核子内部的斥力是巨大的。