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Objectives: The association between body height and social status is known. We were interested in the effect of intergeneration changes in social status on height., Methods: Body height was measured in 2008 paternal grandfather-father-son and 1803 paternal grandfather-father-daughter triplets. The sample consisted of four child cohorts born in 1988, 1985, 1983, and 1980, and was measured annually from 6 to 11, 9 to 14, 11 to 16, and 14 to 18 years of age. Triplets were dichotomized according to grandfathers' occupation, into one "lower" and one "upper" grandparental class; and according to paternal education, into one "lower" and "upper" paternal class, resulting in four "family histories": two nonmobile (grandfathers and fathers stayed in the same social class), and two mobile histories (social class of fathers and grandfathers differed)., Results: "Upper" class fathers are taller than "lower" class fathers. This class effect on height persists into the third generation. Upward social mobility ("lower" class fathers receive secondary or university education) results in taller stature both in the fathers and in the children. The opposite applies for downward social mobility. "Upper" class fathers with only basic or vocational education lose the social advantage and remain shorter. So do their children., Conclusions: The class effect on height tends to persist into the next generation, but depends on education. Upward social mobility measured as a "better" education, results in taller stature, up to the third generation. The study highlights the importance of education as a major regulator of body height., (© 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.)

Objectives: The aim was to determine whether an intergenerational trend toward increased stature is slowing down, and whether body weight has recently increased among young men in Poland, as it has in Western European countries., Methods: Data were taken from six national surveys of 19-year-old Polish male conscripts from cohorts 1965, 1976, 1986, 1995, 2001, and 2010., Results: The mean stature of this population increased throughout the last 45 years from 170.5 cm in 1965 to 178.3 in 2010. However, the average gain in stature per decade declined from 2.4 cm in the period 1965 to 1976 to 0.8 cm per decade in 1995 to 2001, but increased to 1.0 cm in the last period. The average of body weight increased from 63.2 kg in 1965 to 73.1 in 2010 and body mass index (BMI) rose from 21.73 to 22.94 in the same period. The tempo of increase varied in different periods; between 1965 and 1986 an insignificant increase was observed (of circa 0.12); in 1986 to 1995 there was no increase, whereas the period of 2001 to 2010 witnessed a significant increase (of circa 0.76)., Conclusions: The trend of body size and stature increase within the Polish population, although decelerating, remained positive and steady during the last 45 years. No significant impact of the past half-century's socioeconomic crises was observed in these measures of growth. We concluded that during the economic crises some effective mechanism protecting the living conditions of the children and youth were operating within the population., (© 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.)

Human migration and its economic, social, and demographic effects can lead to health consequences for individuals and populations. In the present study, we estimated differences in health status between migrant (those who had come to Wrocław at the age of > or =16 years) and nonmigrant (those who had lived in Wrocław since birth or had come with their parents) inhabitants of Wrocław, Poland. Three hundred and sixty seven males and 496 females aged 40 and 50 underwent medical examination, and were asked to fill out a questionnaire comprising social, demographic, and life style information. Health status was assessed by blood pressure, heart rate, fasting lipid profile, glucose, height, and measures of fatness (BMI, WHR, sum of skinfolds). Comparisons were made based on Borkan's and Norris's profiles. Student's t-test showed significant differences in diastolic blood pressure, heart rate, total cholesterol, and glucose levels between two groups of males, in favor of migrants. Male migrants were also significantly taller than their peers born in Wrocław. In females, migrants had significantly lower blood pressure and heart rate than nonmigrants. In interpreting the results two possible, not mutually exclusive, mechanisms are proposed: selective spatial mobility, and changes toward healthier life style as an adaptation to new urban environment.

Rates of premature mortality among adults are important measures of the economic and psychosocial well-being of human populations. In many countries, such rates are, as a rule, inversely related to the level of attained education. We examined changes in educational group-specific mortality rates among urban adults in Poland during the country's rapid transition in the 1990s from a socialist command economy to a free market system. Two census-based analyses of individual death records of urban dwellers aged 35-64 years were compared. We utilized all records of death, which occurred during the 2-year periods 1988-89 and 2001-02. Population denominators were taken from the censuses of 1988 and 2002. The age-specific mortality rates were used to evaluate absolute differences in mortality. To assess relative differences between educational levels, mortality rate ratios (MRRs) with 95% CI (confidence interval) were calculated using Poisson regression. A regular educational gradient in mortality persisted in each 10-year age group throughout the period covered by our data. Moreover, age-specific mortality rates declined steadily in all educational groups, and this decline was most marked in the two oldest age groups (45-54 and 55-64 years). The trend was accompanied by widening of educational differences in mortality as expressed by MRRs. Systemic political transformation in Poland has brought a mixture of beneficial and detrimental effects on the well-being of society. With regard to the changes in rates of premature mortality among adults, the benefits have prevailed, although individuals with the lowest educational level benefited less than those with the highest education., (Copyright 2007 Wiley-Liss, Inc.)

This study tested the hypothesis of a linear increase of the BMI with age among adults. Materials comprised 32,762 occupationally active females and males 23-59 years age resident in Wroclaw, southwestern Poland. All subjects were medically examined in the course of health screening. The BMI increases linearly with age in women, but increases with age in men in two stages--a more intensive rise between 20-40 years and much slower increase between 40-60 years. This hypothesis was verified with a linear regression model in women but for men piecewise regression with a break at 40 years of age fits the age trends., (Copyright 2002 Wiley-Liss, Inc.)

Twenty-three different, socially homogenous groups of 19-year-old males were selected from a total sample of 57,000 Polish conscripts examined in 1986 and in 1995. Each group consisted of age-mates equated for six criteria of social background: 1) maternal and 2) paternal education, 3) maternal and 4) paternal occupational status, 5) number of children in the family, and 6) degree of urbanization of the subject's locality of residence. Within every one of the 23 groups, subjects who at the age of 19 years were secondary-school or college students, were taller than socially similar peers, who by that age had never moved beyond the level of basic vocational school. Thus, a significant association exists between an individual's potential for upward social mobility and tallness. Such associations must be taken into account when considering the origin and nature of the commonly observed taller stature of the upper over the lower social strata in present-day industrial societies. Am. J. Hum. Biol. 12:97-101, 2000. Copyright 2000 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

Age-, sex-, and maturity-associated variation in subcutaneous adipose tissue (SAT) distribution is reviewed and then considered longitudinally in a sample of Polish youth. Current study of adipose tissue distribution places considerable emphasis on abdominal adiposity, specifically intra-abdominal or visceral adipose tissue (VAT). Most studies of children and adolescents do not include an abdominal skinfold, and when it is available, the skinfold is grouped with others as a sum of skinfolds. Correlations between abdominal VAT and SAT based on computerized tomography in non-obese children are moderate to high, and those between the suprailiac and abdominal skinfolds and abdominal VAT are moderately high. Changes in three individual skinfolds (triceps, subscapular, abdominal) and ratios of the skinfolds were considered by chronological age and relative to the timing of peak height velocity (PHV), and in children of contrasting maturity status in participants of the Wroclaw Growth Study, 193 boys and 197 girls, who were followed longitudinally from 8 to 18 years of age. Individual skinfolds behave differently during childhood and adolescence, and the changes are influenced by the timing of the adolescent growth spurt. Sex differences in estimated velocities are negligible up to about 2 years before PHV; then velocities tend to be higher in girls. The velocity of the triceps skinfold is negative in boys just before and after PHV; estimated velocities for the trunk skinfolds are positive through the growth spurt in both sexes, and are somewhat greater after PHV, especially in girls. The individuality of changes in individual skinfolds during the adolescent spurt contributes to changes in the relative distribution of SAT at this time. The timing of the adolescent growth spurt is an important factor influencing the distribution of SAT both in the total sample and in youth classified as early and late maturing. Am. J. Hum. Biol. 11:189-200, 1999. Copyright 1999 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

Longitudinal studies have shown repeatedly that little or no correlation exists between the timing of the pubertal spurt in stature and adult stature (AS). However, the possibility seems to have been overlooked that such near-zero correlations may, at least theoretically, be an artefact resulting from two opposite tendencies that cancel each other out: a hypothetical "biological" tendency for early maturers to end up as slightly shorter adults and a socially induced tendency, resulting from the existence of social gradients in growth, for accelerated maturation to be accompanied by taller A.S. Data of the Wroclaw Growth Study (355 fitted growth curves) were used to see whether making a sample socially more homogeneous produces any increase in the correlation between age at PHV and AS. No such effects were found. Thus the validity of the view is confirmed that genes controlling the timing of the spurt also affect the shape of the growth curve in such a way that the shorter time available for completion of growth in the early maturers is compensated for by a greater intensity of the spurt itself. © 1994 Wiley-Liss, Inc., (Copyright © 1994 Wiley-Liss, Inc., A Wiley Company.)

The effects of three factors in the social environment on variation in stature were evaluated in two large samples of 19-year-old Polish conscripts, one examined in 1976 (birth cohort 1957) another in 1986 (birth cohort 1967). The factors were: A) population size of the locality of the conscript's habitation, B) occupational-educational status (OES) of the father, and C) size of the conscript's sibship. In each cohort, stature decreased monotonically with decreasing population size, decreasing paternal OES and increasing sibship size, each factor exerting a significant influence on stature even after the influences of the other two were partialled-out by analysis of variance (ANOVA) procedures. However, the order of the strenght of the influences has changed from B > C > A in 1976 to C > B = A in 1986. The most notable change was the decline in the importance of factor B. The condition of being a peasant's son depressed stature less in 1986 than in 1976, but the stature-depressing effect of the condition of being a rural dweller, as well as that of coming from a large family, has not diminished. Overall, secular gains in stature among groups lowest on the statural and social scale in 1976 have been more intense than among those highest on these scales, which resulted in an attenuation of some social contrasts in stature from 1976 to 1986. © 1992 Wiley-Liss, Inc., (Copyright © 1992 Wiley-Liss, Inc., A Wiley Company.)

On the basis of two successive surveys of 19-year-old Polish conscripts, one in 1976 and another in 1986, secular trends in stature and the relationship between stature and population size of locality of habitation were examined. In spite of the serious economic crisis in the early 1980s and a rather abrupt cessation of the trend towards earlier menarche in Poland between 1977 and 1987, the trend towards taller stature continued unabated and was intense (2.0 cm in the general population). In 1976, stature decreased systematically with decreasing population size in the following order: (1) cities over 500,000, (2) cities between 100,000 and 500,000, (3) towns between 25,000 and 100,000, (4) towns below 25,000, and (5) villages. A similar gradient persisted in the 1986 survey. In 1986, about one-half of the total statural gradient was accounted for by the gap between rural conscripts and those next on the urbanization scale, i.e., conscripts from the smallest towns, and the magnitude of this gap was unaltered during the decade. However, the rural-large city gap has declined from 3.6 cm in 1976 to 2.8 cm in 1986. The relative shortness of rural conscripts and the tallness of their large-city age peers are consistent with the pattern of social variation in stature and maturation rate observed among Polish school children and with the country's postwar economic and social history., (Copyright © 1991 Wiley-Liss, Inc., A Wiley Company.)