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X-Genes as Related to Spelling of Prentice, Prentis and Prentiss
What is your gene?Why do some of us spell our name Prentice while others use Prentis or Prentiss? It may have something to do with our genes.
A new study has found evidence that may explain the difference in spelling. Dr. Skuse, of the University of London's Institute of Child Health and his colleagues determined there was a difference in social skills which appeared to be gene-dependent. Normally women are born with two X chromosomes - one from their mother and one from their father - while men have only a single X from their mothers. In some instances, however, women have a damaged second X chromosome or only one X chromosome which may be inherited from either the mother or the father.
Curious whether there would be some corrolation with the spelling of our surname as Prentice, Prentis or Prentiss, we conducted a survey among our correspondents as to those who had knowledge of their X chromosome structure, or, in the case of men, the X structure of their mothers. In order to minimize the number of variables, we limited our survey to descendants of Valentine Prentice.
For those families in which the mother had two X chromosomes, there was a very high correlation with the spelling of the surname as Prentice.
However, interestingly, those families in which women had only a single X chromosome tended to spell the name Prentis, while those with a damaged second X chromosome tended to spell the name Prentiss.
If you have any comments, other than that I must have damaged chromosomes, I would enjoy hearing from you. You may contact me at dewald@prenticenet.com..
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