Here is a little trick. Think of someone famous whom you consider successful. Now I bet the first letter of their last name is in the first half of the alphabet. Was I right?

According to a surname study by Richard Wiseman of The Daily Telegraph, success has a higher chance for those in the first half of the alphabet rather than the latter half. Polling readers Daily telegraph readers, Wiseman asked respondents were asked for their sex, age, surname and rate how successful they had been in various aspects of their life, such as their health, finances, career, and “life in general”. According to his data, the people whose last names begin with A,B,C… rated themselves more successful than those with …X,Y,Z last names.

One theory offered to explain this phenomenon is due to the way we arrange names in a list. In school, lists of students would usually be sorted in alphabetical order based on the surname. Those with last names higher on the list are generally picked first leaving the people lower on the list to be picked last. This may not seem like such a big deal until you consider this short coming spread out over the entire life of the person. When we put this into the perspective of a lifetime it is easy to see how the last half of the alphabet people can be stuck with a lack of confidence. Apparently where we are on the last name list has an impact on how we see ourselves.

This isn’t an absolute rule however, just look at Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple. There is also Shaquille O’Neil, Tiger Woods, Oprah Winfrey among others. So don’t despair N-Z last namers, there is still hope you will reach success. You guys just have a slight statistical disadvantage. Sorry.