Heights and Weights in a Girls' Public School

Abstract

THERE is good evidence to show that the average heights of adults have been increasing in several European countries during the past fifty years. Measurements of large numbers of conscripts have been recorded, and for this period they show rates of increase which are not the same in all countries, but are all of the order 1 inch in 25 years. This is an extremely rapid rate, and it is clear that it cannot have been maintained for any long period in the past. The statures of various populations of Europe in prehistoric and early historic times can be estimated from measurements of the long bones of series of skeletons, and they do not indicate any marked departures from the averages observed to-day. The increase in modern times has also been observed in Japanese and Indian groups and in North American groups of European origin, and it is possible that the trend has been world-wide. The cause of this phenomenon can only be conjectured, and an explanation which attributes it to better nutrition and hygiene is not altogether satisfactory.