Sex Determination Using Nonmetric Characteristics of the Mandible in Koreans

The mandible is the largest and hardest facial bone and retains its shape better than other bones in the forensic and physical anthropologic field. The mandible can be used to distinguish among ethnic groups and between sexes. We examined the morphological characteristics of the mandibles of 102 Kor...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of forensic sciences 2006-11, Vol.51 (6), p.1376-1382
Main Authors: Hu, Kyung-Seok, Koh, Ki-Seok, Han, Seung-Ho, Shin, Kyoung-Jin, Kim, Hee-Jin
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adolescent
Adult
Aged
Aged, 80 and over
Anthropology
Asian Continental Ancestry Group
Bones
Face
Female
forensic anthropology
Forensic Anthropology - methods
Forensic odontology
forensic science
Forensic sciences
Humans
Korea
Male
mandible
Mandible - anatomy & histology
Middle Aged
nonmetric characteristics
Sex Characteristics
sex determination
Sexes
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Summary:The mandible is the largest and hardest facial bone and retains its shape better than other bones in the forensic and physical anthropologic field. The mandible can be used to distinguish among ethnic groups and between sexes. We examined the morphological characteristics of the mandibles of 102 Koreans of either sex. Of 13 nonmetric items of the mandible, the characteristic that best allowed the sexes to be distinguished was the contour of the lower border of the mandible: rocker‐shaped mandibles predominated in males (68.1%), whereas most females (84.6%) exhibited a straight mandible. In addition, the mental region was shaped differently between the sexes: the shape of the chin in most males was generally bilobate or square (91.7%), whereas the chin in females was either square (45.5%) or pointed (54.5%). In this study, the positive predict values of male and female were 92.5% and 73.7%, respectively. Therefore, the nonmetric method used to analyze the mandible in this study can be used for sex discrimination.
ISSN:0022-1198
1556-4029
DOI:10.1111/j.1556-4029.2006.00270.x