Well, technically, Peppermint did kind of come from Mint. However, the connection is small. Back when there was an LXDE edition of Mint, Kendall Weaver was the programmer of that "spin." However, he left to start Peppermint with Shane Remington and that ended Mint LXDE. Peppermint One may have even been based on the code for Mint LXDE. But, that's where the connection ends, as the distro obviously has moved in its own direction since then.
As for that list, move Peppermint to #1, remove everything else but Mint, and you have the two best distros for beginners. I don't think much of Zorin, Elementary or Manjaro. Ububtu went to $#!t several versions ago. I've never actually used Linux Lite or Ubuntu Studio. (though, I'm not a fan of specialized distros like Ubuntu Studio)