'Stranger Things' May Have Influenced Baby Names in 2016

The Stork delivered thousands of adorable little demogorgons in 2016, and the debut of "Stranger Things" may have inspired some of their names. However, the boosted names do not seem to include "Eleven" or "Barb." Justice denied, once again!

Instead, Good Housekeeping noted these interesting pop culture influences from the 2016 BabyCenter list:

"Netflix's 'Stranger Things' gave Nancy a 46% increase, while other characters from the summer's runaway hit like Dustin (up 32%) and Lucas (up 25%) got a big boost too.

Politics also inspired parents this year, making the name Hillary 64% more popular. Donald was also up this year with a 5% increase, while the name of the president elect's daughter, Ivanka, rose 39% as well."

You probably can't give "Stranger Things" much credit for a Lucas boost. That name was already pretty popular. But Nancy? That's probable. Good on ya, Nancy Wheeler! It pays to be the "real heroine" of "Stranger Things."


Also, props to Hillary for at least winning the baby name game over Trump. It's not much, but...

Most of those names (except for Lucas) still aren't among the top picks, which were calculated from 400,000 parents who shared their newborn's name with BabyCenter in 2016. Here are the top names for each gender:

MOST POPULAR GIRLS NAMES

Sophia
Emma
Olivia
Ava
Mia
Isabella
Riley
Aria
Zoe
Charlotte
Lily
Layla
Amelia
Emily
Madelyn
Aubrey
Adalyn
Madison
Chloe
Harper
Abigail
Aaliyah
Avery
Evelyn
Kaylee

MOST POPULAR BOYS NAMES

Jackson
Aiden
Lucas
Liam
Noah
Ethan
Mason
Caden
Oliver
Elijah
Grayson
Jacob
Michael
Benjamin
Carter
James
Jayden
Logan
Alexander
Caleb
Ryan
Luke
Daniel
Jack
William

As GH noted, this is not the official U.S. government list -- that list doesn't combine similar names that are spelled differently, like Sophia/Sofia -- and it will be released in early 2017. But it's an early look at how trends affected the children born in 2016.

Meanwhile, "Stranger Things" Season 2 is now filming for release on Netflix in 2017. Any chance "Hopper" might make the baby list at some point, in honor of the chief?

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