Old Wives' Tales Gender Quiz

The 12 Old Wives' Tales in This Quiz

Every family seems to have an aunt or grandmother who can "just tell" whether you are having a boy or a girl. These are the 12 signs they are usually reading, and the supposed logic behind each one.

How you look and carry

Carrying high vs. low. This is the tale strangers love to announce in the grocery store. A bump that sits high and wide supposedly means a girl, while a low, compact, out-front bump means a boy. In reality, how you carry depends on your muscle tone, torso length, baby's position, and whether this is your first pregnancy.

Skin breakouts. The classic line is that "girls steal your beauty." Breakouts, dullness, and melasma get blamed on a daughter borrowing your glow, while clear, radiant skin is credited to a boy. Pregnancy hormones cause skin changes in every direction regardless of who is in there.

Hair changes. The flip side of the beauty tale: fuller, shinier, faster-growing hair points to a boy, while hair that turns dull or limp points to a girl. Most pregnant women actually get thicker hair either way, because elevated estrogen keeps strands in the growth phase longer.

How you feel

Sweet vs. salty cravings. Reaching for chocolate, fruit, and dessert supposedly signals a girl, while chips, pickles, cheese, and anything savory signals a boy. Cravings are real, but research links them to hormones and culture, not the baby's sex.

Morning sickness. Rough, lingering nausea is said to mean a girl, an easy first trimester a boy. This one has a sliver of a real observation behind it: severe hyperemesis gravidarum is slightly more common in pregnancies carrying girls. But ordinary morning sickness varies far too much from person to person to predict anything.

Mood swings. Big emotional swings get pinned on a daughter's "extra estrogen," while an even, mellow mood means a boy. Pregnancy moods are shaped by sleep, stress, support, and hormones that surge in every pregnancy.

Cold feet. An odd but persistent one: feet that suddenly run cold mean a boy, feet that feel the same as always mean a girl. Circulation changes during pregnancy are universal and have nothing to do with sex.

The rituals and readings

Fetal heart rate. The most "medical-sounding" tale: above 140 beats per minute means girl, below 140 means boy. It feels plausible because it uses a real number from a real appointment, but studies have thoroughly debunked it (more on that below).

The wedding ring test. Dangle a ring on a string or strand of hair over the bump. Circles mean girl, side-to-side swings mean boy. This is dowsing, plain and simple, and the ring goes wherever tiny involuntary hand movements send it. Still one of the most fun tales to do at a shower.

Sleep side. Naturally drifting to your left side means a boy, your right side a girl. Conveniently, sleeping on your left is also what most providers recommend in later pregnancy for blood flow, so this tale predicts a lot of boys.

Partner's sympathy weight. If your partner is gaining weight alongside you, the tale says girl; if their jeans still fit, boy. Sympathy symptoms in partners (couvade syndrome) are a real documented phenomenon, but they say nothing about the baby's sex.

Mother's intuition. The simplest tale of all: deep down, you already know. Many moms swear by their gut feeling, and it is the one "method" with a hint of intrigue, since one small study found hunches beat chance, though later research never confirmed it.

Where Do These Tales Come From?

Before ultrasounds arrived in the 1950s and became routine in the 1970s and 80s, families had nine long months of wondering and exactly zero ways to find out. Old wives' tales filled that gap. Most of them grew out of simple pattern-matching: a grandmother noticed that her daughter carried low and had a boy, told the story at every gathering, and a "rule" was born. The hits got remembered and retold; the misses were quietly forgotten.

Many of these tales appear, in some form, across cultures and centuries. Versions of the carrying high-or-low rule show up in European folklore going back hundreds of years, ring dowsing has roots in much older divination practices, and the "girls steal your beauty" line exists in dozens of languages. They survive because they are social, hopeful, and fun, a way for everyone from your mother-in-law to the checkout clerk to participate in the anticipation.

Is There Any Science Behind Them?

Honestly: no. Each tale, when studied, performs at or near coin-flip accuracy. The fetal heart rate myth deserves special mention because it sounds the most credible. Researchers have tested it directly, including a 2006 study in Fetal Diagnosis and Therapy that examined nearly 500 first-trimester pregnancies, and found no significant difference between the heart rates of boys and girls. Fetal heart rate changes with gestational age and how active the baby is at that moment, not with sex.

If you want a real answer, you have two reliable options. NIPT, the non-invasive prenatal blood test, analyzes fragments of fetal DNA in your blood and can report sex with over 99% accuracy from about 10 weeks. The anatomy scan, the detailed ultrasound done between 18 and 22 weeks, is how most parents find out, as part of a scan that also checks growth and development. Everything else, including this quiz, the Chinese calendar, and your aunt's ring trick, is entertainment. Wonderful, time-honored entertainment, but entertainment.

So tap through the tales, compare notes with your partner, and bring your score to the next family dinner. Just maybe wait for the scan before you order the name banner.