Trends in physical stature across socioeconomic groups of Chilean boys, 1880-1997

Short men in poor lands: The agrarian workers from southwestern Spain in anthropometric perspective

With a sample of heights of almost 60,000 men, born between 1855 and 1979 and recruited between 1876 and 2000, our work analyzes the nutritional gap between the agrarian and non-agrarian population in Extremadura, a Spanish region located among the poorest ones in Europe. The analysis reveals that this difference is not only statistically significant, but also tends to increase as the average stature of the active population grows. Among the causes of the agrarian height penalty, our article focuses mainly on the economic differences. However, the research also insists on the roots of these differences, especially those linked to the adverse physical conditions of the territory, the dynamics of the Christian conquest in the Middle Ages and the strong and persistent concentration of land ownership in the region. In short, this paper concludes that the anthropometric gap between agrarian and non-agrarian workers is due not only to economic causes, but also to geographical, historical and institutional reasons.

Malnutrition Rates in Chile from the Nitrate Era to the 1990s

Following Salvatore and the WHO, in this article, we provide the first long-term estimates of malnutrition rates for Chile per birth cohort, measured through stunting rates of adult males born from the 1870s to the 1990s. We used a large sample of military records, representative of the whole Chilean population, totalling over 38 thousand individuals. Our data suggest that stunting rates were very high for those born between the last three decades of the nineteenth century and the first two decades of the twentieth century. In addition, stunting rates increased from the 1870s to the 1900s. Thereafter, there was a clear downward trend in stunting rates (despite some fluctuations), reaching low levels of malnutrition, in particular, from the 1960s (although these are high if compared to developed countries). The continuous decrease in stunting rates from the 1910s was mainly due to a combination of factors, the importance of which varied over time, namely: Improved health (i.e., sharp decline in infant mortality rates during the whole period); increased energy consumption (from the 1930s onwards, but most importantly during the 1990s); a decline in poverty rates (in particular, between the 1930s and the 1970s); and a reduction in child labour (although we are less able to quantify this).

The Escape from Malnutrition of Chilean Boys and Girls: Height-for-Age Z Scores in Late XIX and XX Centuries

We studied the trends of height-for-age (HAZ) Z scores by socioeconomic status (SES) groups of Chilean boys and girls aged 5-18 born between 1877 and 2001, by performing a meta-analysis of 53 studies reporting height-for-age sample data from which 1258 HAZ score datapoints were calculated using the 2000 reference growth charts for the US of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). We found stagnant mean and median HAZ scores of about -1.55 to -1.75 for the general population, and -2.2 to -2.55 for lower SES groups up to cohorts born in the 1940s. However, we found an upwards structural change in cohorts born after the 1940s, a period in which HAZ scores grew at a pace of about 0.25 to 0.30 HAZ per decade. Since this change happened in a context of moderate Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth, high and persistent income inequality, and stagnant wages of the working class, we discuss the extent to which our findings are associated with the increase in public social spending and the implementation and expansion of a variety of social policies since the 1940s and early 1950s.

The Height of Children and Adolescents in Colombia. A Review of More than Sixty Years of Anthropometric Studies, 1957-2020

In this article, we present a review of the studies on the heights of children and teenagers in Colombia published since 1957. We focus on examining the geographic coverage, features of the population studied, height measurement techniques, authors’ profiles, and growth patterns in children. This relatively recent literature has been developed mainly by medical doctors who carried out rigorous measurements with highly specific time and space horizons. The first studies emphasized the differences among socioeconomic levels. Later, there was an interest in minority groups, such as indigenous people and Afro-descendants. Although most of the research lacked long-term vision, the overall balance shows that the country has been improving in anthropometric indicators over time, across territories, and in different socioeconomic groups.

Stunting Rates in a Food-Rich Country: The Argentine Pampas from the 1850s to the 1950s

Little is known about the effects of malnutrition rates in the long-run. Applying the methodology recommended by the World Health Organization, this study estimates stunting rates for Argentine adult males from the 1850s to the 1950s. We use five large samples of army recruits, prison inmates, militiamen, and electoral records totaling 84,500 cases. These samples provide information about height in Buenos Aires province and the Pampa region, the most fertile, food-producing area of the country. As the study shows, estimated stunting rates remained stable from the 1850s to the 1880s and then declined persistently until the 1950s. The total decline was substantial: if fell from 15.3% in the 1870s to 5.6% in the 1940s, then stagnated. In this 95-year period, stunting rates went from "medium" to "low" levels in the WHO classification of malnutrition intensity. At the end of our study period (the 1950s) the Pampa's malnutrition rate was only 3.5 to 4 percentage points above contemporary estimates for well-developed economies in Europe and North America. A significant expansion in the region's production of grains and beef (food availability), combined with a sustained decline in infant mortality (increased health) were probably the two main underlying factors of this long-tern reduction in malnutrition. Yet, this association remains to be determined.

Height of Male Prisoners in Santiago de Chile during the Nitrate Era: The Penalty of being Unskilled, Illiterate, Illegitimate and Mapuche

This article contributes to the study of inequality in the biological welfare of Chile’s adult population during the nitrate era, ca. 1880s–1930s, and in particular focuses on the impact of socioeconomic variables on height, making use of a sample of over 20,000 male inmates of the capital’s main jail. It shows that inmates with a university degree were taller than the rest; that those born legitimate were taller in adulthood; that those (Chilean born) whose surnames were Northern European were also taller than the rest, and in particular than those with Mapuche background; and that those able to read and write were also taller than illiterate inmates. Conditional regression analysis, examining both correlates at the mean and correlates across the height distribution, supports these findings. We show that there was more height inequality in the population according to socioeconomic status and human capital than previously thought, while also confirming the importance of socioeconomic influences during childhood on physical growth.

Nutrition status in adult Chilean population: economic, ethnic and sex inequalities in a post-transitional country

OBJECTIVE

To assess the relationship between malnutrition, socioeconomic status (SES) and ethnicity in Chilean adult population.

DESIGN

Nationally representative survey (ENS) conducted in 2016-2017. Sociodemographic information, weight, height and hemoglobin (Hb) were measured (2003 ENS). Excess weight was defined as BMI ≥25 kg/m2. Undernutrition included underweight (BMI <18·5 kg/m2), short stature (height <1·49 m in women and <1·62 m in men) or anaemia (Hb <12 g/l). Education and household income level were used as indicators of SES; ethnicity was self-reported. We applied linear combinations of estimators to compare the prevalence of excess weight and undernutrition by SES and ethnicity.

SETTING

Chile.

PARTICIPANTS

In total, 5082 adults ≥20 years (64 % women) and 1739 women ≥20 years for anaemia analyses.

RESULTS

Overall, >75 % of women and men had excess weight. Low SES women either by income or education had higher excess weight ((82·0 (77·1, 86·1) v. 65·0 (54·8, 74·1)) by income; (85·3 (80·6, 89·0) v. 68·2 (61·6, 74·1) %) by education) and short stature (20-49 years; 31(17·9, 48·2) v. 5·2 (2·2,11·4) by education); obesity was also more frequent among indigenous women (20-49 years; 55·8 (44·4, 66·6) v. 37·2 (32·7, 42·0) %) than non-indigenous women. In men, excess weight did not significantly differ by SES or ethnicity, but short stature concentrated in low SES (20-49 years; 47·6 (24·6, 71·6) v. 4·5 (2·1, 9·5) by education) and indigenous men (21·5 (11·9, 5·5, 11·9) v. 8·2 (5·5, 11·9)) (P < 0·05 for all).

CONCLUSIONS

In Chile, malnutrition is disproportionately concentrated among women of low SES and indigenous origin; these inequalities should be considered when implementing prevention policies.

New anthropometric evidence on living standards in nineteenth-century Chile

A sample of over 44 thousand Chilean marines was used to estimate the trend of mean heights from the 1820s to the 1890s. We confirm that there was height stagnation in the last decades of the nineteenth-century Chile despite sizeable per capita GDP growth; there were hidden nutritional costs to this economic growth. This situation resembles a similar puzzle in antebellum USA or early industrial Britain, but in the case of Chile GDP growth is not explained by industrialization but by export-led-growth. Still, the results are similar: height stagnation. Regarding the determinants of adult male height, our data also convincingly showed that there was a significant correlation between height and literacy. There was a positive correlation between height and white ethnicity, and, linked to this, a strong negative correlation between stature and eyes reported as "black". Finally, living in urban environments (or environments with higher population density) also negatively affected height.

Educational level and its relationship with body height and popliteal height in Chilean male workers

A secular trend in body height has been experienced in many nations and populations, hypothesized to be the result of better living conditions. Educational level has been shown to be closely associated with body height. This study examined the changes in body height and popliteal height in a group of adult Chilean male workers by age cohort and the relationship of these with educational level. The body heights and popliteal heights of 1404 male workers from the Valparaíso and Metropolitan regions of Chile were measured in 2016. The sample was grouped by level of education (primary, secondary, technical and university) and age (21-30, 31-40 and 41-50 years). Robust ANOVA and post-hoc analyses using a one-step modified M-estimation of location were conducted based on bootstrap resampling. Both body height and popliteal height increased from the older to the younger age cohort. The largest increase was from the 41-50 to the 21-30 group, with a 1.1% increase in body height and 1.7% increase in popliteal height. When educational level was introduced into the analysis there was a marked increase in both body height and popliteal height for each cohort, but only in primary- and secondary-educated workers. Despite showing an overall increase in body height and popliteal height, younger workers with the highest levels of education showed fewer differences between them than did older workers with less education. The differences were larger in the older than in the younger cohorts. Similarly, this trend was less clear in workers with higher levels of education (technical and university), probably because of a dilution effect caused by increased access to higher education by workers in the lower income quintiles.

Early life environment and adult height: The case of Chile

In this paper, we analyze the relationship between adult height and early-life disease environment, proxied by the infant mortality rate (IMR) in the first year of life, using cohort-region level data for Chile for 1960-1989. IMRs show a remarkable reduction of 100 points per thousand over this thirty-year period, declining from 119.4 to 21.0 per thousand. We also document a 0.96 cm increase in height per decade.We find that the drop in IMRs observed among our cohorts explains almost all of the long-term trend in rising adult heights, and that per capita GDP does not appear to have any predictive power in this context. Results are robust in a variety of specifications, which include area and cohort dummies, an adjustment for internal migration, and urbanization rates. Our results point to the long-term effect of a public health policy.

Height in eighteenth-century Chilean men: Evidence from military records, 1730-1800s

This article provides the first height estimates for the adult population for any period of Chilean history. Based on military records, it gives an analysis of the average heights of male soldiers in the last eight decades of the colonial period, c.1730-1800s. The average height of Chilean men was around 167 centimetres, making them on average taller than men from Mexico, Italy, Portugal, Spain and Venezuela, but of a similar height to men from Sweden. However, Chilean men were clearly shorter than men in neighbouring Argentina, the USA and the UK. Chilean height remained stable during the 1740-1770s, but it declined by some 2-3 centimetres between the 1780 s and the 1800s, in line with a fall in real wages due to increasing food prices and population growth.

Estimation of stature from hand and handprint measurements in Iban population in Sarawak, Malaysia and its applications in forensic investigation

Handprints and dismembered hands are commonly found during crime scene investigations and disaster victim identifications, respectively. It has been indicated that the accuracy of handprint and hand measurements for estimating stature maybe population specific. Since Iban is the largest ethnic population in Sarawak, Malaysia and because the application of anthropometry of hand and handprint within this population as well as other populations within the Southeast Asian countries remain unreported, this present study that investigated the reliability and accuracy of these two anthropometric aspects acquires forensic significance. Upon measuring the height, 21 measurements were recorded on each hand and the corresponding handprint of 50 male and 52 female consented adult Iban subjects. Using univariate statistics as well as simple and multiple regression analyses, interpretation of the measurements examined here was attempted. Results revealed that lengths of hand and handprint are the more reliable traits for estimating stature in both the male and female Iban subjects (p < 0.05) with correlation strength ranging from 0.60 to 0.76. Comparable to the established skeletal standards for hand, the stature prediction accuracy using hand and handprint measurements investigated in this research ranged between 4.29 and 5.78 cm. Hence, this research provided the first forensic standard for estimation of stature among the Iban population in Sarawak that may prove useful for crime scene investigations and disaster victim identifications in Malaysia.

Economics, human biology and inequality: A review of "puzzles" and recent contributions from a Deatonian perspective

The Nobel laureate Angus Deaton concentrated his work on puzzling developments and phenomena in economics. Puzzles are exciting elements in economics, because readers feel challenged by the question of how they can be solved. Among the puzzles analyzed by Deaton are: (1) Mortality increase of white, U.S. non-Hispanic men (2000 to today); (2) Why are height and income sometimes closely correlated, but not always?; (3) Height inequality among males and females; and (4) The Indian puzzle of declining consumption of calories during overall expenditure growth. This article reviews these "puzzles" and the main insights that Deaton derived from their discussion insofar as they pertain to the biological aspects of human development. I will focus on the field of this journal, Economics and Human Biology, in which Deaton has been very active over the last two decades. I will also document some of the responses by other scholars and their contributions to these puzzles, as they relate to the field of economics and human biology.

Two worlds apart: Determinants of height in late 18th century central Mexico

Anthropometric literature on the American territories of the Hispanic monarchy before their independence is still scarce. We attempt to expand the field with a case study that includes some important novelties. Albeit our main source, the military records of the Censo de Revillagigedo (conducted in the early 1790s), has already been used, the sample size and the geographical scope are unprecedented: 19,390 males of four ethnicities (castizos, españoles, mestizos, and mulatos) aged from 16 to 39 from 24 localities, including towns and villages scattered across central regions of the Viceroyalty of New Spain. We build a database that, complemented with information on resource endowments obtained from other sources, permits to analyze the determinants of height. Our results show the importance of spatial differences as well as the significance of ethnicity, occupation, rurality, age and resource endowments as determinants of height. Unprivileged mulatos are only 0.5cm shorter than, assumedly privileged, españoles in the "first world" (El Bajío) and 1.3cm taller in the "second world" (Eastern Central Highlands). In turn, living in the "first world" implies being between nearly 1.5cm and 5cm taller than the inhabitants of the "second world". Our estimates of physical statures are placed within an international comparative context and offer a relatively "optimistic" picture.

The decline in BMI among Japanese women after World War II

The body mass index (BMI) of the Japanese is significantly lower than is found in other high-income countries. Moreover, the average BMI of Japanese women is lower than that of Japanese men, and the age-specific BMI of Japanese women has decreased over time. The average BMI of Japanese women at age 25 decreased from 21.8 in 1948 to 20.4 in 2010 whereas that of men increased from 21.4 to 22.3 over the same period. We examine the long-term BMI trend in Japan by combining several historical data sources spanning eleven decades, from 1901 to 2012, to determine not only when but also how the BMI decline among women began: whether its inception was period-specific or cohort-specific. Our nonparametric regression analysis generated five findings. First, the BMI of Japanese women peaked with the 1930s birth cohort. This means that the trend is cohort-specific. Second, the BMI of men outpaced that of women in the next cohort. Third, the BMI of Japanese children, boys and girls alike, increased steadily throughout the 20th century. Fourth, the gender difference in the BMI trend is due to a gender difference in the weight trend, not the height trend. Fifth, these BMI trends are observed in urban and rural populations alike. We conclude that the BMI decline among Japanese women began with those who were in their late teens shortly after World War II.