Nareg's Poll of the Day - Armenian or Persian?

I conducted an un-scientific poll over text message today. It was regarding the ethnicity of a doctor at the hospital I am at right now. For reasons of privacy, I will not reveal the name here on the blog, but here were the resutls:

11 people polled, percentages reflect eventual final answers

Armenian         27%

Persian             36%

I don't know    18%

Other                 9%

No Response     9%

Now, those results are not as interesting as the process of trying to elicit a concrete response. The question was "either-or". Meaning, those polled were given the name and 2 choices: Armenian or Persian. You'll notice above that at least 4 different responses were made when these choices were NEVER provided. Human nature is a funny thing, we can't stay within the lines. If proper responses were given, they were usually accompanied by additional comments. Otherwise I had to keep working to get a proper reply. Examples of responses:

"Huh?"

"What's the difference?"

"Persian Jew"

"Armenian. We think everyone's Armenian"

"Is it a Parskahye name?"

One person outright FAILED the poll. How someone fails a poll is beyond me, but this person managed, no names *cough* Diko *cough, cough*.

It was an amusing process to glean through my "data" to get actual numbers. In the end, Your Humble Observer has no better idea about the background of the name, but at least he now has new fodder for this and future blog posts.