Roxanne Aloia hugs her daughters, Alexis, 10, left, and Avalon, 5. Alexis goes by Lexus, which leads some people to mistakenly believe the girls are named after cars. Photo by Craig L. Moran. Click image for enlargement.

Roxanne Aloia appreciates fine cars. She drove a Cadillac until last Christmas, when she got a new Chrysler 300 luxury sedan.

But the Las Vegas mother insists no car theme was intended when she and her husband, Eddie, named their daughters: Alexis, 10, whose nickname is Lexus, and Avalon, 5, who goes by Ava.

Avalon is named after a Catalina Island town, Aloia says, not the Toyota model that went upscale in a redesign four years after she was born. And Alexis seemed a unique name at the time.

People tease Aloia about the alleged auto connection.

"They make a joke about it and say, 'What will the next (child) be, a Porsche? When are you opening your car dealership?' " said Aloia, who is 42.

"It's all in fun."

It's also understandable that consumers, even in jest, associate brand names with baby names.

After all, the two have been linked at least since 2000, when Social Security records reportedly showed some Americans were naming their children L'Oreal, Armani, Del Monte, Courvoisier and even ESPN.

In the mix were Infiniti, Celica, Chevy.

Traditional names still dominate -- Emily and Jacob have remained the nation's top female and male names since 1996 and 1999, respectively. That's according to the Social Security Administration, which will release the most popular names for 2006 on Mother's Day. Emily also is the most popular girl's name in Clark County, while Anthony ranks first for newborn boys.

But pop-culture influences, including celebrities who have given their offspring such monikers as Pilot Inspektor, Moxie CrimeFighter and Apple, have fueled a zeal for unusual names aimed at setting children apart from the herd.

Many noncelebrity parents choose more subtle names but spell them creatively, substituting "y" for "i" and "x" for "cks," and even inserting the occasional apostrophe.

While tweaking the alphabet is nothing new, the wordplay can get extreme. According to BabyCenter.com, there are 45 ways to spell the popular girl's name Mackenzie.

Anagrams also are hip. Nevaeh, which is heaven spelled backward, climbed the popularity charts to become the 70th hottest female name in 2005. The same year, it was the third most popular name for black girls in Clark County; Miracle was seventh.

Meanwhile, Angel ranked second for all local male infants and first for Hispanics alone.

Perhaps topping them all is Unique, a name given to hundreds of baby girls nationwide in most years since 1995. (If it becomes pedestrian, there's always Youneek.)

Parents may find that despite their efforts, their children aren't so one-of-a-kind.

That's what Aloia learned when she enrolled Alexis in preschool, where a handful of other kids had the same first name.

"I found out how un-unique that name was," she said.

CLASSICS VERSUS CULTURE

The abundance of baby names, as evidenced by the many books, Web sites, message boards and blogs devoted to the subject, explains why even the most popular names nowadays capture only a small percentage of total births.

Their numbers are diluted by the sheer volume of choices.

While family names prevail, the "anything goes" mentality in the United States is in contrast to cultures where tradition often dictates naming an infant after relatives or religious figures, according to Clara Jean "C.J." Senif, an adjunct anthropology professor at Community College of Southern Nevada.

"Names are the one cultural marker that ... change everyday," said Senif, who has a master's degree in linguistic anthropology and has studied naming trends among blacks, Mormons and Jews.

"Every single solitary day, one group of people dies off and a new group of people are born, and they reflect the culture of that day, that moment. ... You watch these name shifts over time, and you can see the temperament of the entire country, culturally."

After John F. Kennedy was assassinated in 1963, Senif said, there was a sudden spike in girls being named after the former first lady.

"Jacqueline was a public figure of composure and everything that it meant to be womanlike," she said. "She was strong, she was beautiful. ... Everybody wanted their little girl to be named Jacqueline."

Similarly, Ariel, a classic boy's name in the Middle East, became a popular girl's name after the 1989 movie, "The Little Mermaid."

"These kinds of spikes happen because we are a pop-media culture," Senif said. "The problem with pop-culture names is that most of the time, they don't have any sustainability."

Madison is an exception. The nation's No. 3 favorite female name in 2005 was popularized by the 1984 movie "Splash."

Meanwhile, Paris Hilton may be mistakenly credited for the earlier popularity of her name. It hit No. 494 in 1991, when she was 10 years old and not yet in the public eye.

With the heavy media attention Hilton has drawn this decade, Paris peaked at No. 157 in 2004, dropping to No. 206 a year later.

"Absolutely a reflection of her, not of the name itself," said Senif. "Now, if she does stuff that is just too much pathetic," the name probably would drop to previous levels.

POWER BROKERS

The names parents pick say more about them than their children.

Annual income plays a role in whether parents consider the long-term implications of a child's name, including how it would look on an executive suite door.

"Once you get in that $80,000 to $100,000 range, that becomes true," Senif said. "But how much of our total population is up there -- 10 percent?"

Names typically travel from the top down the socioeconomic ladder, according to Stephen J. Dubner, an economist and co-author of The New York Times best-seller "Freakonomics."

Dubner told ABC News last year that rich-sounding names may make a person sound privileged but not necessarily smarter.

In other words, names don't determine success.

Study conclusions vary on whether it helps to have a common or uncommon name.

But in 2004, the ABC newsmagazine "20/20" found that job applicants with distinctively black names got fewer responses than those with white-sounding names, even though they had identical resumes.

Parents of various races freely tap foreign languages in search of names with special meaning. But just because a word or phrase translates into "little river" in Swahili doesn't mean East Africans are actually naming their children that, Senif noted.

Anissa Szabo gave her 2-year-old son, whose father is of Indian descent, an authentic Hindu name. It's Ronak, which means "celebration."

"It was important for his father to give him a traditional Hindu name," she said. "It is his culture, his heritage."

(In a nod to Szabo's side of the family, Ronak's middle name is Robert, a name shared by three of her relatives.)

The name Ronak is unusual enough to elicit curiosity but not ridicule beyond the normal childhood teasing, said Szabo, 31. Nor is it ethnically recognizable enough to stereotype.

One ethnic name that is gaining popularity is Angel. It rose to No. 32 nationwide in 2005, the same year it was the top name for Hispanic males born in New York City.

In Clark County, almost 95 percent of boys named Angel that year had Hispanic mothers.

Valerie Fridland, an associate English professor at the University of Nevada, Reno, said the name in time could be adopted across the board, if earlier naming patterns among Irish and Italian immigrants are any indication.

"The same process is occurring now," said Fridland, who has a doctorate in linguistics. "It just depends which immigrant group is flooding the market, so to speak. Then it becomes mainstream."

Fridland said people in the West are more likely to extend the practice of naming children after cities to natural phenomena, such as mountain ranges.

Some parents aren't limited to places found in an atlas.

Mollie Halvorsen, a local Realtor, said she and her husband gave their baby girl the middle name of Bijou after a movie theater in Eugene, Ore., where they went to college.

Her first name, Ziya, is after keyboardist Zia McCabe of The Dandy Warhols, one of her husband's favorite bands.

"We had to really think about it, we really wanted to make sure that it wouldn't hinder her," said Halvorsen. "I can see Ziya Halvorsen as president, but it is still unusual enough that there wouldn't be another person with the same exact name running against her."

Melissa King said though her daughter and son, Kennedy and Carter, bear the surnames of past Democrat presidents, they weren't named after them.

"I really wasn't making a political statement, although I consider myself a Democrat," said King, who is 35. "We just like the name. Kennedy was first choice if Carter had been a girl, so we just kind of picked them because we like the way they sound -- the hard 'K' sound."

Elizabeth Flippin, an assistant account executive at R&R Partners, had no say in naming her stepson Chance.

Not one for trendy names, she said her baby due March 31 will be John King Flippin.

He will be called King, a family name on her father's side.

"Technically, it will be a middle name, but the family tradition is everyone's first name is John and a different middle name," said Flippin, who is 25.

"With the last name Flippin, we wanted a very strong name. We'd like him to be maybe a lawyer or a doctor -- it does give him options with John. It would make a great author's name -- J.K. Flippin."

Senif, the anthropology professor, said her daughter, MaryElizabeth Ann, also has choices.

"I thought it was a great name for a girl because girls hate their names, no matter what you do. Mary -- what can she do with that? I can do Mary, I can do Elizabeth, I can do Liz, I can do Beth, I can do Liza, I can do Mary Beth ..."

Her daughter ultimately chose to go by her initials, Mea.

"No matter how singularly atrocious a name is, people tend to make their names work," Senif said. "You find some functional level within it."