Mind-blowing statistics and crazy connections—from the number-crunching genius behind a popular blog. Based on findings on Correlated.org, this surprising and very funny book presents bizarre-but-true correlations between seemingly unrelated things. Based on daily polls and statistical analysis, in CORRELATED , Gallagher reveals: • People who prefer Miss Piggy to Kermit the Frog are more than twice as likely than average to have tattoos • People with body piercings are twice as likely as the average person to have deployed a fire extinguisher • People with bumper stickers on their car are more likely than average to have square danced You’ll never look at poll results or scientific sound bites the same way again! Praise for Shaun Gallagher's website Correlated.org: “We predict this site will launch a thousand graduate theses" –Freakonomics "Help further the cause of science!" —Pee-wee Herman   "A totally trustworthy-looking website" —Cracked.com   "Hysterical site" —Dean Karlan, Yale Professor of Economics   "Pretty much the best website ever." —Facebook analytics manager Alex Bain Praise for Experimenting with Babies : " Experimenting with Babies is a wonderful book, giving parents a hands-on way to understand their baby's emerging mind.  The experiments are easy, fun, and nicely annotated with the real science behind them.  What a fabulous way for parents to get to know their new child!" —Lise Eliot, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Neuroscience at the Chicago Medical School of Rosalind Franklin University and author of What's Going On in There? How the Brain and Mind Develop in the First Five Years of Life “With the marketplace urging parents to buy all manner of things to make their babies ‘smart,’ Gallagher’s book offers parents a view based in science on how much babies really know and figure out on their own.  Parents will have fun with this book and gain new respect and awe for their babies’ amazing capabilities.” —Roberta Michnick Golinkoff, Ph.D., H. Rodney Sharp Professor, University of Delaware and coauthor of How Babies Talk, Einstein Never Used Flash Cards , and a Mandate for Playful Learning in Preschool   Shaun Gallagher is a writer and a former magazine and newspaper editor who runs the popular website Correlated.org that explores the surprising world of statistics. He is also the author of Experimenting with Babies. He lives with his wife and two sons in Wilmington, Delaware.   INTRODUCTION If you’ve ever wondered whether iPod owners are more likely to stir their drinks counterclockwise, whether nonfiction lovers are more likely to have a positive opinion about France, or whether tea drinkers are more likely to prefer mechanical pencils, then this is the book for you! The data that underpin the statistics you’ll find in this book come from Correlated.org, a website devoted to uncovering surprising correlations between seemingly unrelated things. Each day, a new poll question is posted on the site, and at the end of the day, the poll responses are tallied up and compared with the results of every previous poll to find the two responses with the strongest correlation. For this book, I’ve taken Correlated.org’s large data set—1,089,173 poll responses from 36,305 respondents—and generated all-new statistics in which the results of each poll were compared not only with previous polls but with the entirety of the available data. For the 182 topics chosen for inclusion in the book, the median sample size was 2,290 and the mean sample size was 2,222. Although the statistics in this book are all based on real data, the methodology by which the correlations are generated is not intended to stand up to professional scrutiny. (In fact, it would probably make a professional statistician weep.) Rather, the correlations are intended to be amusing and thought provoking, and to illustrate some of the absurdities that result when you ignore tricky concepts such as confounding variables or the multiple-testing problem. I hope you enjoy the surprising statistics presented here, and I hope you’ll join the thousands of others who help generate new correlations by contributing to Correlated.org. ’80s Music 40% of people have boycotted a company. But among those who consider music from the ’80s to be oldies, 52% have boycotted a company. ---------------- 53% of people are Foo Fighters fans. But among those who consider music from the ’80s to be oldies, only 41% are Foo Fighters fans. ---------------- 70% of people are adept at using chopsticks. But among those who consider music from the ’80s to be oldies, only 58% are adept at using chopsticks. DOUBLE PLAY You’re extremely likely to consider music from the ’80s to be oldies if you both: always wash your hands after using a public restroom - prefer Jake Gyllenhaal’s movies to Maggie Gyllenhaal’s NO CORRELATION People who consider music from the ’80s to be oldies are almost exactly as likely as the average person to: have be