When it comes to red or blue states, how far do the colors go? There are studies that show our language - what we tweet - reveals our political views. Past studies have even shown that politics might be hardwired in our genetics and even show in how often we get to the gym, but what about the rest of our lives? Does political preference play a role in our family composition? Of course, by "family," we are referring to the furriest members: our dogs.
HNGN's Pets Happy Zone learned some new tricks from Rover.com's pet lifestyle expert, Brandie Gonzales, who wanted to know "political views aside - was it possible to pull out canine trends between Democrats and Republicans?"
The analytics team at Rover.com compiled election data from the 2012 presidential election. Of the 123 million votes cast for Barack Obama, Mitt Romney or other candidates, election data was established for each metropolitan statistical area (MSA) to determine if a particular MSA would be considered "red" or "blue."
The team then determined what dogs breeds were most popular in that area. The top five breeds for each MSA were listed. Popular dog names in each MSA were culled from dog registries. "Since the list of possible names is much larger than the list of possible breeds, each MSA was assigned as either 'red' (over 5 percentage point spread in favor of Romney) or 'blue' (over 5 percentage point spread in favor of Obama)," Gonzales explained in an email to Headlines and Global News. "The names were then ranked by popularity across all red and blue MSAs as a whole to determine the 500 most popular dog names in red and blue metro areas, respectively."
"The most shocking thing we discovered was that our data actually proved that there was a distinction between blue and red states and which dog breeds they prefer," Gonzales wrote. "The traditionally blue states showed a lean towards the poodle, Maltese and Yorkshire terrier breeds, and the traditionally red states showed a higher percentage of border collie, boxer and Australian shepherd breeds."
Less shocking to learn, perhaps, are preferences for dog names. "While traditionally Democratic states opted for names like Bernie (Sanders), Franklin and Chelsea (Clinton), traditionally Republican states leaned more toward (Ronald) Reagan, Red and Ike (Dwight D. Eisenhower)."
Check out the infographic below and see how true this is for you!
