Why do parents mix up their children’s names? Science answers

Calling your children by the name of brother or sister is not a sign of lack of interest or poor memory, but rather a sign of love.

• It often happens that a father and mother mix up their children’s names
• The “wrong name phenomenon” is not due to poor memory or lack of attention
• A study revealed that writing your children’s names incorrectly is a sign of your love for them
• In the brain, similar or related information is stored close to each other
• Baby names are placed by parents in a special category, so confusing them means they are equally important

How many times in your life has your mother mistakenly called you your sister or brother and how many times today as a mother does the same thing happen to you with your children?

The confusion of their names is not due to poor memory, extreme stress, physical similarity between their children or the names they bear, and it does not even mean that they are not very important to the parents. In fact, it’s quite the opposite.

The phenomenon of misnomers

According to a study published in the journal Memory and perceptionConfusing your children’s names is a sign of great love. A mother who mistakes the names of her two children is because she cares for them. A team of researchers from Duke University’s Department of Psychology and Neuroscience conducted five studies with More than 1,700 participants To examine the so-called “The phenomenon of misnomers“Among familiar individuals.

Mothers usually name their babies after their siblings and not a random kid in the neighborhood who looks like them or someone they saw on TV. This happens because of the way our minds organize people’s names and information about them.

Mental indexing of nouns

The brain uses aSemantic network“(Basically a filing system) where similar or related information is stored close together. So when your mind searches for your firstborn’s name so you can yell at him to put the laundry away, he may pull the wrong ‘file’ from the Family Folder for By mistake and your other child’s name appears.

Children’s names are entered by the parents In a special category Therefore, mixing them means that they are equally important to the mother and father. In the category there are also other people who are very close emotionally.

Read also: Using your smartphone in front of your children harms the development of their emotional intelligence

Basically, the closer you are emotionally to someone, the more likely you are to “forget” them or confuse their name with the name of someone else about whom you feel similar feelings.