(singing happy birthday)
(clapping and cheering)
- Welcome to "It's Personal," a show exploring
what makes you, you.
(cheerful music)
- You've always probably considered your birthday
a pretty unique trait of your personal life.
And that's true, it kind of is.
But at the same time, you also share that birthday with
millions and millions of other people.
So in a way, it's not unique at all.
One fun thing I like to do at parties is go around
and collect data from all my friends, see if any of them
share the same birthday.
One, because I'm a pretty fun guy and I know how to party,
but two, because it's a fun way to test
the birthday paradox.
Observe.
Hey Weston!
- Yeah?
- When's your birthday?
- April 15th.
- April 15th, does anybody else here
have an April 15th birthday?
- I do.
- [All] Oh!
- Pretty weird, huh?
Here's how this works.
The birthday paradox refers to the likelihood of two people
within a random group, sharing the same birthday.
Given the fact that there are 366 possible birthdays,
inclduing February 29th.
- Sup?
- It doesn't seem all that likely.
But, in a room of 23 people, there's actually more than a
50% chance that two of those people
share the same bithday.
If that seems high, consider this.
In a group of 23 people, there are actually 253
possible chances for a match.
So, might not make sense to your brain,
but that doesn't really matter,
beause you know, math.
Okay, makes sense right?
Kinda, kinda?
Alright, hey let's test it out on the street.
I'll be right back guys, alright?
- I was gonna eat that.
- So we're out here on the streets to put the bithday
paradox to the test.
By the time we hit 23 people, there's a 50.7% chance
that two of them will have the same birthday.
Are we gonna be that lucky?
I don't know, let's find out!
Alright so here's our first person, your name is?
- Bob.
- Bob, when's your birthday?
- January 30th, 1959.
- Now since you're the first person, there's no chance
of you winning this.
- [Bob] That's okay.
- When's your birthday Casey?
- November 30th.
- [Voice over] No match!
- November 26th.
- [Voice over] Oh, no match!
- October 15th.
- [Voice over] That's not a match!
- Still don't have a match, but it's pretty good.
We're getting there.
Hello there sir, what's your name?
- Odin.
- [Voice over] Cool name!
- Odin, when's your birthday?
- June 21st.
- [Voice over] No way!
- September 26th.
- [Voice over] Not a match!
- April 15th.
- [Voice over] I don't think so!
- January 11th.
- [Voice over] Not a match!
- Here we go.
- August 25th.
- [Voice over] No match!
- January 23rd.
- [Voice over] No match!
- September 18th.
- [Voice over] No match!
- Rod, when is your birthday?
- My birthday is January 4th.
- [Voice over] Oh, no match!
- I'm so sorry, Rod.
- Well then I guess this is goodbye.
- It is.
Oh!
- September 24th.
- October 31st.
- May 8th.
- [Voice over] Uh ah.
Nope!
Oh!
- None of these are matches.
Sorry guys.
I'm here with...
- Jackie.
- And Fernando.
- And what do we got for birthdays?
- October 31st.
- I think October 31st is a big winner!
- I think it's a winner, let's double check!
Jackie!
- [Voice over] That's a birthday match!
- It's a winner!
- [Voice over] Spooky Halloween bonus!
- I got a special treat for you guys.
- This is the best day ever! (laughs)
- So there you go, here's your nice Halloween cake.
Guys, thank you for...thank you for being born!
So there you have it, 16 people, and we found
two wonderful souls with the same birthday.
On Halloween of all days!
How spooky.
So the birthday paradox, it's a real thing.
So there you have it, sixteen people
and we found a match.
There's only about a 28.05% chance of that happening,
and it only gets higher from there.
If we'd talked to 60 people, it would've been about
a 99% chance of finding of finding a match.
Pretty crazy guys, huh?
- Yeah.
Hey Shane.
- Hey.
- Are you the youngest of your siblings?
- Yeah, how'd you know?
- Well, the youngest children have been shown
to be risk takers.
Like they'll take a cake right out of a party
and not bring it back.
- Oh so yeah, I guess you can probably blame that
on my brother then.
- Well, before we do that, I wanna know if these
birth order studies carry any weight.
So I got some siblings to play a game show.
Let's see how well they do.
(upbeat music)
- [Kate] Are you guys ready to play?
- [All] Yeah.
- Studies suggest, which sibling is more social?
Suggesting they might be better at parties.
- Most social, okay fine.
They used to tell me when I was three I would grab people
at weddings and just dance with them out of no where.
- Did that last week too.
- Oh, we all said oldest!
- Taking that party title!
- Okay, I'm not saying I'm the life of the party
in all situations.
- (giggling) Well you do love a good party.
- I do love parties.
- [Kate] So it's actually middle children.
[Buzz]
No one guessed right.
- Oh, okay.
(laughing)
- A study found which sibling tends to be a perfectionist?
- I don't think we even have to discuss this one.
- Wanna say it all together?
- [All] One, two three, middle.
- If assigned to science, then this one.
(all laughing and mumbling)
- Since when!?
It's you!
For instance, you were cooking those like,
egg wraps from that cookbook.
She didn't get it right the first time,
she made it the next day, you planned to make it again.
- [Kate] Yup Emily, you guessed right.
It is oldest children.
- Oh you were right.
- (laughing) I knew it!
- Maybe I'm just trying to not be a perfectionist.
- Which sibling has been shown to be most empathetic
of the family?
- Oldest for sure.
- I think he's the most empathetic.
He knows it.
- [All] Oh!
- Well I definitely think that Jessica is the most
empathetic of all of us.
Because you're very sweet and kind.
- You always send like a follow up text.
- I send you those emoji things on texts.
- Oh yeah, the emojis.
- I like those.
- [Kate] Yes, that's right!
Younger children have been shown to be the most empathetic.
- [All] Yay!
- So, we can see the studies are kind of accurate.
Our siblings, or our lack of siblings,
they totally shape our lives.
So maybe the majority of first borns are all
successful perfectionists, like myself.
But that doesn't mean all oldest siblings are.
- Oh hey, guys.
I got a joke for you.
- Alright.
- What do professional NHL players, and European youth
soccer players have in common?
- I don't know.
- January birthdays!
Here, check this out.
Suppose you were born in January.
That would come just after the cut off date for some sports.
So if you were 15 on January first, you would play
for the 15 year old team.
Even if you were turning 16 on the second.
Studies have shown that this age gap can give you
an advantage, because on average you're bigger and stronger
than the younger competition.
This is called "the relative age effect."
September is the cut off date for most schools
in the United States.
So if you're born in September, theoretically,
you should be the best at sports.
Actually, hold on a second.
Does being born in September make you better at sports?
I'm here at Buzzfeed to find out.
(upbeat music)
- Oh, ya know what, I certainly wasn't the worst.
I wasn't interested in being the best.
- Patrick was bad at sports.
- I mean, kinda.
I was kind of bad.
- Well, I first broke my nose while doing gymnastics
and then I broke it again because a basket ball
hit me in the face in gym class.
Maybe I'm not as athletic as I thought I was as a kid.
- Yeah I was usually pretty high up on the
skill level scale.
(laughs) I don't wanna sit here and be like
"I was the best at sports,"
but I kinda was.
- In high school I was probably like a 4 or 5.
In elementary school I was probably like a 2 or a 3.
But my heart level was like a 10, I believed I could do
anything I wanted.
- I was the team captain of my high school tennis team.
I was the team captain of my squash team.
I made varsity football.
Oh and I played rugby in college for a while too.
- I sent out a survey to Buzzfeed employees to see
what's the highest sports team they ever played for.
According to our study, most people quit after high school.
But we actually found that there's three people here
that played professional sports.
And two out of those three people were born in
October and November.
So, maybe your birthday does have an effect.
But we don't know for sure.
- Oh hey.
- Hey, so what if you're born in like July.
- Well, it's not really an exact science.
- I went to the junior Olympics throughout high school
for fencing.
My birthday is August 10th, 1992.
- Look, if you wanna play sports, then play sports!
It doesn't matter if you're smaller than the competition,
you can't let your birthday hold you back!
(clapping and cheering)
- So our birthdays shape us in a lot of ways
that we never even thought.
But our birth date doesn't define who we are.
So really, it's just an excuse to hang out with friends
and have a good time.
So enjoy it.
Anyway, that's been our show.
Thanks for watching "It's Personal."
Bye!
- Bye!
(upbeat music)
(sound effects)