NCJ Number
229698
Journal
Journal of Forensic Sciences Volume: 55 Issue: 1 Dated: January 2010 Pages: 149-152
Date Published
January 2010
Length
4 pages
Annotation
The most accurate and precise methods for the assessment of age and stature often require knowledge of sex. Thus, being able to correctly identify sex from skeletal remains is critical in the forensic context.
Abstract
The presence of the os coxae or skull can never be guaranteed, making the development of reliable methods of sex estimation using other skeletal elements necessary. Using a 724 individual calibration sample from the Hamann-Todd collection, this study identifies sexual dimorphism in the human scapula, and presents a new five-variable discriminant function for sex estimation. The overall accuracy of this method proved to be 95.7 percent on the cross-validated calibration sample, 92.5 percent on an 80 individual test sample from the Hamann-Todd collection, and 84.4 percent on a 32 individual test sample from the skeletal collection of the Wichita State University Biological Anthropology Laboratory. Additionally, a slightly less accurate two-variable model was developed and has cross-validated accuracy of 91.3 percent. 5 tables and 41 references (Published abstract)