Assessing zygomatic shape and size for estimating sex and ancestry in a South African sample

Tawha, Tafadzwa; Dinkele, Elizabeth; Mole, Calvin Gerald; Gibbon, Victoria E.

doi:10.1016/j.scijus.2020.01.003

Cited by 4 publications

(4 citation statements)

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“…116 A great example of the aforementioned social and historical forces at work is the Apartheid legislation in South Africa that significantly constricted the gene flow resulting in major inter-population differences. 11,18,39,97,104 It becomes clear that under the influences of both intrinsic and extrinsic factors, biological traits become intertwined with social and historical events, and thus, the examination of ancestry is in fact more complicated than the typological approaches dictate. Along those lines, researchers 21,115 suggest that the use of a more detailed, broad synthesis that is focused on regional evolutionary forces for the purpose of identifying the underlying patterns of human variation, would be more accurate and appropriate.…”

Section: Discussion: Further Considerations and Conclusionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Applications of GMM can be found in various disciplines including bioarchaeology, 94,95 physical 81,96 and forensic anthropology 89,91,97 for purposes of ancestry estimation. Based on the literature, most research conducted is based on adult samples, with few exceptions focusing on sub-adult individuals.…”

Section: Geometric Morphometrics (Gmm)mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Aside from the degree of shape variation of the entire cranium, various morphological traits such as the nasal aperture shape and zygomatic morphology have been assessed through GMM in European and South African samples. 11,18,88,97 Traditional morphological traits like for example orbital shape have also been used for ancestry estimation following a https://doi.org/10.2147/RRFMS.S272224 DovePress GMM-centered technique on Europeans, Africans and Asians. 100,101 Although sample size or sex bias present limitations, this approach offers a new possibility for 3D shape evaluation of traits traditionally assessed through simple macroscopic observation.…”

Section: Geometric Morphometrics (Gmm)mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…They also observed that in the European American population, the incorporation of size notably improved classification accuracy, as was pointed out by other studies. 97 Buck et al 99 also examined shape variation on the mandible on a sub-adult sample achieving, however, lower accuracy rates (<70%), discouraging the employment of the method.…”

Section: Geometric Morphometrics (Gmm)mentioning

confidence: 99%

See 3 more Smart Citations

Ancestry Estimation: Advances and Limitations in Forensic Applications

Flouri¹,

Alifragki²,

García-Donas³

et al. 2022

RRFMS

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Forensic anthropologists are faced with many challenges one of which is setting the grounds for the assessment of an unknown individual's population affinity, an essential element for building a biological profile that can lead to positive identification. A heavy body of literature is dealing with the topic of "race" -in early studies -or "ancestry/population affinity" -in more recent articles -in an effort to provide reliable tools for this challenging task. A great and ongoing debate exists on whether this type of classification should be done at all or whether it should be accepted as a "necessary evil". The over-simplistic categorization of people originating from vast geographical areas without taking into account micro-evolutionary and environmental factors, that are of great importance and influence population affinity, can greatly enhance social discrimination and stigma. On the other hand, it must be stressed that the point of assessing an individual's ancestry or geographic origin in a forensic context is not a matter of taxonomy or population labeling but rather an asset to the identification process, which can help narrow down possible matches from a missing persons' list. In that vein, the current paper offers an overview of different methodological approaches to the matter of ancestry estimation and aims to gather relevant information about the different approaches used, the current advances and the implications of the assessment regarding positive identification.

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