The Body-Length-Leg Ratio in the General Population and in Mental Hospital Patients and its Possible Significance in Suicide

Abstract

Psychiatrists will welcome Piney's recent preliminary communication (1) on the possible significance of certain physical characters. A series of measurements of about 500 bodies revealed that a very high number of suicides among the general population occurred in persons showing a body-length-leg ratio of over 50, i. e., the leg-length being more than 50% of the total body-length. Piney believes that persons of this type, among other abnormalities, have such mental characters as may lead to suicide. He raises the question whether body-length-leg ratios of over 50 are commoner among the inmates of mental hospitals than in the general population.