Stature Estimation and Gender Perception from the Length of ring finger of the Population of National Capital Region of India

 

Amit Chauhan*, Rhythm Gandhi, Dr. S K Shukla

Amity Institute of Forensic Sciences, Amity University Sec-125 (Noida)- Uttar Pradesh, India-201313

 

ABSTRACT:

In today’s scenario, identification of an individual has become one of the most paramount aspects of investigation as well as identity in our civilization.Technologists have used extent of traditional methods, even stillthe identification of a person through minute details is questionable. During an investigation of crime largely the minute details are recovered from the scene, these details are needed to be studied appropriately to observe the clues which could direct towards the suspect or the culprit of the crime. In the present day, an attempt is made for the analysis of individual from the minute details. Skeleton is the frame of bones which are formed of hard tissue, thus can be preserved over a long period of time after death and it is sometimes the only evidence found for the forensic investigation. Skelton remains could provide the details such as the stature, gender and age of the victim.The study of assessment of stature and determination of sex of an individual from ring finger is done for such crucial cases inwhich unidentifiable or parts of body encountered from a crime scene. We studied the ring finger of the population of national capital region of India ranging from 20-30 age groups and were successfully able to conclude that the suspect could easily be nabbed from ring finger.

 

 

 

INTRODUCTION:

In this era of advent of digital technology, that has facilitated the identification of an individual for various aspects such as, national identity, gender, age, profession or any criminal record or involvement in any conspiracy etc^1,2. Investigation carried out in the cases of natural disaster or explosions or plane crash etc. where the degraded or burnt bodies or body remains are recovered. These remnants are often put for investigator into a problematic situation for the identification of the victim³.

 

In anthropology, the investigator deals with the bone remains to obtain the information about the age, sex, stature of the victim. Human body is composed of 206 bones including long and short bones⁴.

 

 

The investigation of bones is very important for the investigator as sometimes it’s the only evidence found to solve the case.The sex determination from skeleton is only possible, if the individual reaches its adolescence or adulthood. Human skeleton is not sexually dimorphic in nature but it is slightly dimorphic in pre-adolescent children thus it is a difficult task for an forensic anthropologist to determine the sex of children^5,6. An anthropologist can easily differentiate between the genders of adults by morphologically studying the skull and the pelvic bones.

 

Some numerous methods are used by forensic anthropologists to estimate the age at death from remnants by using of a correlation, regression equations which provide assistance in estimating other physical attributes like structure to get aid in the identification of victim⁷. In the previous studies conducted by scientists and researchers, it was observed that a proportions of body segment vary between the population of one place from other place which may be a cause of metamorphosis in environment, occupation etc. Because of different body parts response differently and ripen change in environmental conditions as well as genetics^8.

Assorted studies have been carried out by many anthropologists and researchers over various population to establish a relation between the height/ stature with gender of an individual. This study was conducted by using the ring finger length of both of hands as a parameter of the population of National capital region of India. The researchers were incapable to ascertain the stature and gender of the defunct accurately by use of some statistical equations for completion of this study⁹. The results of this study can be used by forensic anthropologists like other investigative techniques which will standardized and worldwide acceptable for investigation¹⁰.

 

METHODOLOGY:

This study was focused on the gender discrimination from the length of ring finger of the population of national capital region of India. All the samples were collected from the North-East district of Delhi and Yamuna Vihar of Delhi, Barout, Ramala, Sarurpur of DistrcitBaghpat. The purpose of this study was to establish the degree of reliability for the identification perseverance and gender discrimination.

 

MATERIAL AND METHOD:

For this study, 100 individuals including 50 males and 50 females from the age group of 20-30 years were selected and studied. Sample selection was done by simple random sampling method and the consent of the subjects were taken prior by explaining the purpose of this study. All the subjects included (Male and female) in the present study were healthy and had no history of any sort of deformity of the hand, metabolic disorders and any developmental process.To avoid any kind of diurnal variation, all the measurements were taken during day time interval. All the measurement was taken with the help of anthropometric board. Measurements of stature were taken as vertical distance from the vertex to the foot.

 

To measure the stature, all the subjects were asked to stand barefoot on the platform of stadiometer with the upper back, and heels pressed against the wall thus ensuring their upright position, while head was positioned in the Frankfurt horizontal plane^11,12.During the measurement of little finger length, all the subjects were asked to turn inverse their palm and fingers horizontally towards the stand following by the Frankfurt plane¹⁴. The movable rod of stadiometer was brought in contact with vertex in the mid-sagittal plane. All the measurements of thumb were measured with the help of a sliding caliper, when the subjects placed their hands supine on a flat horizontal surface with the fingers extended¹³. The measurement of little finger length was obtained up to one decimal place and avoid any kind of error, all the measurements were taken twice and the average of both of measures were considered for the further analysis. To avoid any kind of instrumental error or variation, all the instruments were verified at significance level and a variation of ±0.01cm was observed.

 

Statistical Analysis:

The data was tabulated, analyzed and subjected to statistical analysis by using SPSS software (latest version, 11.0).

 

RESULT AND DISCUSSION:

When the height of the individual is to be calculated, longer bones of the body are taken into consideration because of their higher correlation coefficient and small error of to estimate the stature^15,16. However, not every time there is a possibility of availability long body bones as and only dissect body parts are available for medical examination and further analysis. Hence, to overcome this difficulty forensic investigators are exploring new parameters and establishing new methods to estimate the stature, gender discrimination by the measurements of head, foot, face, finger lengths, phalanges etc¹⁷.

 

As described earlier, to conduct this study a data of hundred subjects (including male and female) were collected by taking their respective measurements. These measurements are given below in table no.-1-

 

Table no.-1; data of both genders according to age and the measurements of right-hand and left-hand ring fingers.

Serial no.	Age	Right hand ring finger measurement	Left hand ring finger measurement	Age	Right hand ring finger measurement	Left hand ring finger measurement
Female subject’s data				Male subject’s data
1.	28	9.5	9.5	28	9.1	9.2
2.	24	10.3	10.2	24	8.7	8.8
3.	23	10.1	10.2	25	9.9	9.7
4.	22	9.8	9.7	25	9.1	9.3
5.	22	9.6	9.6	22	9	9
6.	24	10.4	10.3	25	9.5	9.4
7.	26	10	10	24	9.8	10.4
8.	23	10	10.1	23	9.3	9.2
9.	23	10.5	10.6	25	9	8.9
10.	24	10	9.8	25	9.3	9.2
11.	23	10.7	10.5	26	10.1	10.1
12.	23	10.5	10.4	26	9.4	9.3
13.	24	9.6	9.6	26	10	9.6
14.	21	10.5	10.5	21	9.2	9.1
15.	21	10.7	10.8	23	8.7	8.4
16.	23	9.8	10.2	24	9.8	9.7
17.	24	10.3	10.4	25	9.3	9.3
18.	30	10.4	10.2	24	9.7	9.8
19.	25	11.1	11.4	23	9.5	9.8
20.	27	9.7	10	24	10	10
21.	25	9.6	9.5	24	9.5	9.2
22.	24	10.4	10.5	25	9.4	9.7
23.	25	10.3	10	25	9.8	9.7
24.	25	10	10.3	24	10.3	10.2
25.	24	10.9	10.7	25	9.3	9.2
26.	23	10.6	10.5	30	9.7	9.6
27.	23	9.8	9.8	24	9.7	9.7
28.	24	10.5	10.5	24	10	9.7
29.	24	10.8	10.4	24	8.8	9.9
30.	24	10.3	10	23	9.1	9.2
31.	25	11.3	11.2	25	9.2	9.2
32.	25	10.3	10.1	25	10	9.7
33.	24	10	10.4	24	9.8	9.9
34.	28	10.4	10.6	23	9.5	9.6
35.	24	10.4	10.4	24	9.8	9.9
36.	25	10.5	10.4	24	9.4	9
37.	23	10.1	10.3	23	9.4	9.4
38.	24	10.8	10.2	24	10.4	10.2
39.	24	10	10.3	28	9.1	6.9
40.	23	10.9	10.7	24	9.1	9.2
41.	23	10.5	10.4	23	10.4	10.2
42.	22	10.1	10.3	24	9.1	6.9
43.	23	10.8	10.2	24	10.2	10.3
44.	23	11.2	10.9	24	9.9	10
45.	23	11	11	23	9.5	9.2
46.	25	11.3	11.5	23	9.3	9
47.	25	10.7	10.4	28	10.6	10.4
48.	25	11.1	11.1	24	9.2	9.2
49.	26	10.7	10.7	26	9.4	9.3
50.	25	10.5	10.7	24	9.7	9.4

 

The dossier of measured length of ring finger of both of subjects including male and female right is described in the given table according to their respective age. When the correlation coefficient of females was calculated, it was observed that; right hand correlation coefficient was 0.8792 and left hand was 0.773. that is very high for significant level at 99% of confidence level. Given in table 2-

 

Table no.2: Pearson correlation coefficient of little fingermeasurements with stature and p value in females

Right Hand			Left hand
Ring Finger	Correlation coefficient	p value	Ring Finger	Correlation coefficient	p value
	0.8792	<0.0001		0.773	<0.0001

 

Similar like of calculated Pearson correlation coefficient of female subjects, the correlation coefficient was calculated for male subjects. The details are given below in table no.-3.

 

 

Table no.3: Pearson correlation coefficient of thumb measurements with stature and p value in males.

Right Hand			Left Hand
Ring Finger	Correlation coefficient	p value	Ring Finger	Correlation coefficient	p value
	0.6856	<0.0001		0.47	<0.0001

 

The regression equation for stature estimation was applied in both of gender (male as well as female).  The regression equation for stature estimation of right hand was 86.67 cm. while for left hand; it was 79.87 cm.  The stature estimation of females below is shown in table no.-4

 

Table no.4: Regression equation for estimation of stature in females.

Right hand (in cm.)		Left hand (in cm.)
Ring Finger	Height =86.67+6.98	Ring Finger	Height =79.87+7.03

 

The regression equation for stature estimation of males are given below in table no.-5

 

Table no.5: Regression equation for estimation of stature in males.

Right hand		Left hand
Ring Finger	Height =94.150+ 7.189	Ring Finger	Height =86.380+7919

 

The regression coefficient estimation for females is given below in table no.-6.

 

Table no.6: Regression coefficient estimation for females.

Fingers (Ring)	Constant in cm (b˳)	Regression coefficient in cm (b1)
Right Ring Finger	132.87	2.63
Left Ring Finger	121.76	3.76

 

The regression coefficient estimation for males is given below in table no.-7.

 

Table no.7: Regression coefficient estimation for males.

Fingers(Ring)	Constant in cm (b˳)	Regression coefficient in cm (b1)
Right Ring Finger	86.38	7.91
Left Ring Finger	94.15	7.18

 

During this study, a significant correlation was observed between the ring finger and the stature which is highly encouraging for investigation purpose. The correlation between the ring finger and stature in female was higher in comparison of male. From the regression models derived in the present study the standard error of estimate in the predicted stature was more in males than the females. In other words, the accuracy of stature estimation in females is more than males. The multiplication factor is a manual tool that play a vital role in such conditions where the gender perception and stature is estimated. The findings of this study can be useful to increase the forensic significance, even, when it is compared with another exists study at various populations. During such studies, it may be an interesting fact to observe the effect of geographical area over different population. So as, to evaluate the effect of area/region over population or to study the gender perception whether it exists or not?

 

CONCLUSION:

The identification of commingled mutilated is a challenge for forensic expert/ investigator specially when it is performed at distinguish population.  To establish the stature or to identity an individual from the skeletal remnants, it is very useful tool¹⁸. The importance of estimation of stature from the different body parts cannot be overlooked¹⁹. The findings of present study indicate that ring finger lengths can be used successfully to predict living stature of an individual. Depending on the choice of investigator, either formula derived from regression models or multiplication factors can be used to reconstruct the stature.Such studies help in narrowing down the pool of possible victim matches in cases of identification from mutilated remains.

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Accepted on 23.05.2018        © RJPT All right reserved

Research J. Pharm. and Tech 2018; 11(8): 3279-3282.