When applying to college, for a job or for a scholarship, people try to set themselves apart with descriptions of their singular accomplishments and unique abilities. There's a sense that, in order to succeed, one must be anything other than ordinary.
But Kevin O'Keefe, a former sports manager and magazine journalist who is currently a marketing consultant, spent the last two years searching for the most ordinary person in America.
For his book "The Average American: The Extraordinary Search for the Nation's Most Ordinary Citizen," O'Keefe spent two years traveling across the country compiling statistics that would define the average American.
Some examples of what he found include: the most average American lives within three miles of a McDonald's and eat there at least once a year. He or she eats peanut butter at least once a week, and prefers smooth over chunky. He or she has fired a gun, believes in God and the Bible, showers for about 10.4 minutes a day (but never sings while bathing) and can name all Three Stooges.
Physically, the average American is between five and six feet tall, weighs between 135 and 205 pounds, and is between 18 and 53 years old, according to O'Keefe's research.
"America is a big and diverse place - regionally, racially, etc.," Associate Professor of Sociology and Community Health Rosemary Taylor said. "From that point of view, it's hard to imagine the 'average' citizen."
"But one can calculate averages from statistical data: the 'average American' makes X thousand dollars, has 1.5 children and so on," Taylor said, adding that the statistical methods O'Keefe used could have affected his findings, making interpretation of his results complicated.
Most students interviewed had similar ideas of what the average American would look like. "I picture a white male, in a suburban home, with 2.5 kids and a dog or a cat," junior Marchaun Morrison said. In fact, O'Keefe found that the average American does live in a house, rather than an apartment or a condominium. (And that house is valued at between $100,000 and $300,000.)
"I picture a sort of sitcom family - the average guy is a white male with an office job, and he watches football and baseball," sophomore Martha Simmons said. "I picture him having a wife and kids and a couple of close friends."
The Tufts students interviewed imagined that recreation for the average guy probably centers on sports and vacation. "I'd say he probably watches football on Sundays," senior Jeff Burke said.
"He probably watches a lot of TV and goes on vacation twice a year - and owns a vacation home on the Vineyard or Long Island," Morrison said.
O'Keefe found that the average Joe has nine friends, his closest pal within five years of his own age. But this image of a socially active adult wasn't easy for one student to imagine. "I just don't think of adults having friends," Burke said. "I guess I can see female adults having a few close friends, but not males."
Junior Elizabeth Hammond questioned the usefulness of knowing what makes up the most statistically average person. "I think it's possible to have a statistical baseline, but only knowing that it wouldn't be representative of what an American really is," Hammond said. "And from a statistical perspective, there has to be a wide range of error."
So what about the typical Tufts student? Every student interviewed pictured an entirely different person than the average American. "The average student here is intellectual, very well educated, knowledgeable of worldly events, friendly, opinionated and liberal," Morrison said. "And they visit the Facebook all the time."
"I'd say the average Tufts student is from a supportive family with a middle-class income, from the East Coast or the West Coast, and questions higher authority," Burke said.
"I think of a wealthy New Englander," Hammond said.
