NEW BIAS: ALPHABETISM

A new study, from from the University of Colorado Boulder, says people whose last name starts with one of the beginning letters of the alphabet are more likely to see greater achievements, especially in school. Conversely, those whose name starts with the last letters are subject to more negative effects.The study looked at data from a Wisconsin-based longitudinal study of 3,281 males. The participants were monitored and surveyed periodically from the time they graduated high school in 1957 through 2011. Researchers paid particular attention to how well the men performed in school and the level of success they saw in their adult lives. Those whose last names fell earlier in the alphabet were notably more likely to be viewed in a more positive light by their teachers. To keep the playing field as level as possible, the team only compared participants who had similar IQs and similar grades. “Even though they were the same in every other way, the man with the initial at the front of the alphabet was substantially more likely to be designated informally by teachers as an outstanding student,” says the university economics professor and co-author of the study, Jeffrey Zax.
* …the poor bastard.
* Boo hoo, I’m always last in roll call, I’m gonna make a study that validates my poor grades, waah waaah!
* Zayle, Zawahari, Zaragoza – those guys all got better jobs than Profesor Jeffrey Zax.
* This is why, in baseball, everybody’s heard of Hank Aaron but not Zip Zabel.