Head and face anthropometric study for Chinese children

Abstract

Anthropometric data are valuable when designing products for children. Study on anthropometric growth of children head becomes crucial for head related products such as helmets. Based on the literature, it would be helpful to explore physical growth of children at primary school age. In addition, the investigation on Chinese children’s growth has not been explored in details to discover the similarity and diversity among different ethnic groups, even though differences on head shape for adults have been found between Chinese and Caucasian. This study aims at indicating the growth of head and face for Chinese children using a combination of traditional measurement and 3D scanning technology, and comparing it with Caucasian ethnicity. In this study, 102 Chinese children aged between 5 to 12 years were recruited in Hong Kong. For each participant, six dimensions on head and face were recorded including head circumference, head length, head width, forehead width, face height and morphological face height. A set of growth references were analyzed indicating physical growth on the selected dimensions for Chinese children. All the head and face dimensions were found to keep continuously increasing from 5 to 12 years old. This study statistically verifies the differences of head growth among different age groups, and proposed a measuring strategy for future sizing study to design for Chinese children.