Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 8.djvu/810

 790 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

de I'lnstitut international de statistique J Mr. Ch. Roberts concludes that the result of twenty years of anthropometrical researches prove that physical differences depend upon (a] race and nation- ality, (&} sex, (c) social conditions. In the first table he shows that the difference between the highest and lowest averages of statures in thirty-seven different populations is only 25 centi- meters. In a second table, relative to the stature of children from eleven to twelve years, he shows in 2,862 observations that the average stature in England diminishes according as they are found in more or less favorable conditions of growth. While the average stature of children in the public schools of the country is 55.5 inches, this stature decreases in the middle-class schools, still more in the elementary schools of the country and in those of the artisans in the towns ; again, in the factories and workshops of the country and in the towns ; and it falls to the lowest level in the military asylums, and especially in the indus- trial schools, the average in the latter being only about 50 inches. The third table shows the relative average stature of adults from twenty to thirty years of age, in the different social conditions of life. While the general average for the population of all classes is about 67.5 inches, this average falls, for example, to 65.92 inches in the sedentary occupations in the factories ; and among the tailors it almost equal to that of the sedentary of all classes, which is about 66.16 inches, and scarcely superior to that of the defectives of all classes, 65.65 inches.

A diagram giving the different curves of growth of Belgian and English males shows at every age that the curve is higher for the latter. The difference is greatest between 17 and 18 years. For women the curve of growth is a little inferior to that of men in England up to 12 years; it then exceeds it from 12 to 14, and becomes more and more inferior up to 24. The stature of the children of English soldiers is inferior to that of children in general from 6 to 16 years (diagram 3). According to a table with reference to Australia, drawn up by Dr. F. Nor- ton Manning, girls from 8 to 1 5 years of age are inferior in stat- ure to boys of the same age, but with very small differences ;

'Vol. VI, Part I (1892), pp. 13 ff.