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I myself have never had a nickname. A nickname is possible for my name, which is Janice. Some Janices are called Jan. I was talking with a waitress once whose name tag read "Jan." I asked her if Jan was short for anything. She said, "Yes, Janice." I said, "That's my name. But I'm never called Jan." She said, "Oh, I'm never called Janice."

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So that nickname is possible, but I have never ever been called it by anyone and I don't want to be.

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Both of my younger sisters have nicknames, Patricia who is always called Patty and Pamela who is always called Pam. My father's name was Joseph but he was always called Bud.

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My two children both have nicknames, Victoria nn Torrie and William nn Will. When I think of my nieces and nephews, though, none have nicknames---but only one has a name that lends itself at all to a nickname. John, Andrew, Shane, Heather, Jaime, Colin, Trevor, Mara, Brenna, Kaylen, Janine. The only one that really does is Andrew, but he's called Andrew.

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My SO has a totally unrelated nickname, and so do many of his friends and family members, but he comes from a particular subculture in which that's common.

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If I had to guess, I'd say maybe thirty percent of people have nicknames.

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