Sexy vowel names pulls birds

PERSON’S attractiveness to the opposite sex may partly depend on the sound of their name, it was claimed yesterday.

For men, it pays to have a name with a "front vowel" sound produced at the front of the mouth, such as the "a" in Matt, US researchers found.

Women who took part in a study rated these names as more attractive than those with a "back vowel" sound such as the "aw" in Paul.

For men the opposite was true they preferred women to have "back vowel" names.

The research was conducted by linguist Amy Perfors from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Photographs were posted on the "Hot or Not?" website which allows viewers to rank strangers' attractiveness.

Each photo was posted at different times with different names.

While most experts think there is no inherent relationship between the sound of a word and its meaning, Ms Perfors believes there is some evidence to the contrary.

It may seem counter-intuitive that men with a smaller-sounding front vowel were rated as more attractive, said New Scientist magazine.