Habits, habitats, and heredity: a brief history of studies in human plasticity

American Journal of Physical Anthropology
F S Hulse

Abstract

There has long been controversy concerning the relative importance of environment and ancestry in determining the characteristics of living creatures including members of the human species. At the beginning of the present century most biologists and anthropologists seem to have assumed that environment had little or no effect upon our bodily traits. We inherited them. The studies of Franz Boas on Changes in bodily Form of Descendants of Immigrants cast doubts upon this assumption, and provoked considerable resentment. Since 1911, however, quite a few scholars have confirmed and elaborated upon the findings of Boas. At the same time, many other studies have demonstrated secular changes in bodily size and shape within quite a few different populations. The idea of bodily plasticity has therefore, by this decade, become quite acceptable. This paper recounts the historical sequence of events leading to the change in anthropological assumptions, mentioning the scholars whose work contributed to this important advance in scientific understanding.

References

May 1, 1970·American Journal of Physical Anthropology·J W Froehlich
Jan 1, 1967·American Journal of Physical Anthropology·E Schreider
Mar 1, 1969·American Journal of Physical Anthropology·E Schreider
Dec 1, 1965·American Journal of Physical Anthropology·A Damon
Jul 1, 1967·American Journal of Physical Anthropology·K Kimura
Dec 1, 1957·American Journal of Physical Anthropology·W W GREULICH
Jan 1, 1962·Acta geneticae medicae et gemellologiae·L BECKMAN
Jun 1, 1961·American Journal of Physical Anthropology·G W Lasker, F G Evans
Sep 1, 1946·American Journal of Physical Anthropology·G W LASKER
Dec 1, 1946·American Journal of Orthodontics·E A HOOTON

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Citations

Dec 19, 2012·Journal of Oral and Maxillofacial Pathology : JOMFP·T Prasanth, Tr Saraswathi
Feb 16, 2010·American Journal of Human Biology : the Official Journal of the Human Biology Council·E SannaM E Danubio

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