Anthropometry
Anthropometry is the systematic study of human body dimensions and skeletal structures, playing a significant role in various fields, including criminalistics and medical sciences. It involves the meticulous measurement of physical characteristics, which can provide vital information for identifying individuals, particularly in contexts of forensic investigation. Forensic anthropometry applies these techniques to human remains—be they from accidents, disasters, or criminal acts—to help establish identities through physical traits. This discipline is divided into two subfields: somatometry, focusing on the living body and its dimensions, and osteometry, which concentrates on the bones and skeletal features.
The history of anthropometry dates back to the work of French criminologist Alphonse Bertillon in the late 19th century, who pioneered the measurement-based identification of individuals. Although anthropometry's application in forensic contexts has been somewhat overshadowed by DNA analysis, it remains a critical tool in identifying remains, particularly in catastrophic scenarios. Various dimensions measured can reveal an individual's age, gender, health, and ancestry, aiding law enforcement and scientific communities in their investigative efforts. Despite its historical misuse for racial and social categorizations, modern anthropometry is primarily valued for its objective contributions to forensic science and human identification.
Subject Terms
Anthropometry
DEFINITION: Systematic study of the dimensions of the human body and skeleton.
SIGNIFICANCE: Anthropometry has a long history of use in criminalistics and medical sciences. Forensic anthropometry uses the methods and techniques of physical anthropology in a legal context to help law-enforcement agencies identify human remains.
Anthropometry is the application of a quantified series of measures to the study of the human body with respect to origins, relationships, and individual identity. Forensic anthropometry is the application of anthropometrics to human remains—whether victims of accidents, catastrophes, or criminal acts—to identify characteristics and thus help establish personal identities. Anthropometry can be both objective and rigorous when conducted by trained scientists who are familiar with measurement techniques and their subsequent statistical interpretations.
Scientific Basis
The science of anthropometry is based on several premises. First, the body dimensions of each individual represent a subset of unique features that can be used, like fingerprints, for identification purposes. Second, body dimensions provide information regarding additional characteristics such as gender, stature, and, in some cases, ethnicity. Third, body dimensions shed light on health, size, and morphology of internal tissues and organs. Fourth, certain body dimensions and skeletal remains can provide a record of health, accidents, and diseases and permit determination of health at time of death. All of these elements may aid the identification process.
Anthropometry is divided into two subfields: somatometry and osteometry. Somatometry is the measurement of dimensions of the living body, the cadaver, or body fragments. The measurement of the head and face constitutes a special field within somatometry termed cephalometry. Osteometry is the measurement of the bones and distinctive features of bones such as heads of ball joints, protuberances, condyles, articulations, and bone density of the human skeleton. Systematic measurement of the skull is sometimes termed craniometry. Both somatometry and osteometry have been proven useful in the comparison and identification of geographic variation and patterns among human populations in different areas of the world. Anthropometry is especially useful in the sciences of physical anthropology and the paleontological study of human ancestors and hominid relationships.
Collectively, anthropometric analysis of somatometry and osteometry can provide important information about an individual. Depending on the extent of remains collected, anthropometrists can determine age, sex, stature, body shape, diet, work habits, and sometimes ancestry of an individual. Forensic anthropometry has proven especially useful in missing persons cases; the anthropometrics of discovered remains can be compared with information obtained from physicians, photographs, and other materials to determine the likelihood of a match between the remains and the missing person or persons. Anthropometric data on remains that do not match the missing persons of immediate interest are archived in an electronic database for future possible comparisons.
History
Anthropometry traces its roots to French criminologist Alphonse Bertillon (1853–1914), who reasoned that because no two persons are exactly alike, an individual could be identified on the basis of his or her body dimensions. Beginning in 1882, Bertillon systematically measured various dimensions on the bodies of criminals in Paris jails, including height, length of ear, and length of foot. He laboriously compiled a vast archive of measurements that was successfully used as a guide to identify repeat criminal offenders. The Bertillon system, or bertillonage, as it came to be called, was widely adopted in France and several other European countries.
English scientist Francis Galton (1822–1911) simplified the process originated by Bertillon by reducing the number of body dimensions measured. Galton also introduced the use of fingerprints to identify criminals. The reliability of fingerprints as a means of identification and the ease of fingerprinting were quickly recognized, and fingerprint analysis soon replaced Bertillon’s laborious system of measuring body dimensions as a tool of the criminal justice system.
In the later years of the nineteenth century and well into the early years of the twentieth century, however, anthropologists adopted anthropometrics to compare human races. Although the method was useful at first, anthropometry took a darker turn as some used anthropometric data to suggest that morphological differences among groups of peoples implied superiority of some human groups over others. For example, anthropometry became a political tool in the eugenics policies of the Nazis, who used cranial measurements in an attempt to distinguish Aryans from Jews. In a similar vein, social anthropologist William Herbert Sheldon contended that one could predict the mental, emotional, and social characteristics of a person, as well as personality and potential criminality, on the basis of the individual’s body measurements alone. After the Holocaust, these schools of anthropometry went into decline, and the use of anthropometry to imply racial differences, personality traits, or criminal predisposition was largely discontinued.
Forensic Applications
Although the use of anthropometry in forensic science has been somewhat superseded by the use of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) analysis, anthropometry is still widely used to provide initial identification of human remains in cases of natural disasters, fires, automobile accidents, and catastrophes such as airplane crashes or terrorist attacks. Anthropometry is also helpful in identifying remains that have been deliberately destroyed in an effort to make identification impossible.
Forensic anthropologists must be familiar with both field and laboratory techniques, as they are often among the first to arrive at a site to recover and gather remains for identification. These scientists combine expertise in comparative osteology, human osteology, craniometry, osteometry, and morphology as well as skeletal anatomy and function and skeletal proportions characteristic of different geographic areas. Forensic anthropologists work with other crime scene investigators, such as forensic pathologists, to reconstruct the biological nature of individuals at the time of postmortem examinations; they also provide expertise in criminal cases.
Depending on the amount and nature of remains, forensic anthropometry continues to be useful in providing such information as age, gender, health, past injuries, and injuries that may have caused death. Forensic anthropometry has proven especially useful in cases in which only partial remains have been recovered. Examples of successful uses of forensic anthropometry include the identification of remains from the Vietnam War and other past conflicts, identification of the remains of victims of the 2001 terrorist attack on the World Trade Center, and identification of the skeletal fragments of the last two members of the family of Russian czar Nicholas II.
Bibliography
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