Physical Growth from Birth to Maturity.

This article discusses the physical growth in different periods and the size of the body. It states that there is no correlation between rapidity of growth, either during adolescence or the whole growth span, and final size of the body. The curves of increments show the same three characteristic phases of decreasing, increasing, and again decreasing velocity over a span of years. The article offers a conclusion from repeated measurements of female college students at Tulane University that shorter students, regardless of age, grew slightly more in college than did taller students. The finding that young college freshmen represent a physically accelerated group was confirmed. Weinbach proposed that the surface area of the body may be estimated by multiplying twice the girth of the right thigh by the height. When applied to subjects from birth to eighteen years this method gave results about 2.5 percent lower but very closely correlated with values obtained from the DuBios formula. He also described a method of computing the center of gravity, moment of inertia, and surface area from front and lateral photographs. A cast is made of the part to be measured, the number of discs required to cover the given area determined, and the value computed by weight.