The study of the physical characteristics of men through proportionality

Abstract

The study of the physical characteristics of humans has been a concern throughout history. Proportionality is of interest for several reasons that range from the selection of sport talents to esthetic issues. The aim of this paper is to investigate the procedures for proportionality analysis in the existing literature. First a brief history is provided of the background that lead to the development of procedures such as the ponderal index, body mass index, skeletal index, cormic index, upper member length index, acromio-iliac index and relative span index. Procedures for studying human proportionality, such as the Phantom index, the O-Scale and allometry are then investigated. The literature investigated led to the conclusion that studies in human proportionality should continue to strive to develop better procedures for describing human beings in a global manner, leading to a description realistic more of the human form.