Secular Dynamics of Body Height and Weight in Russian Children Aged 0–17

Abstract

This study deals with long-term temporal changes of body height and weight during various stages of ontogeny: newborns, infancy, early age, fi rst childhood, second childhood, adolescence, and youth. Each age/sex group numbers ca 100 persons, the total sample size is ca 2 000. The meta-analysis is based primarily on growth standards for Russian children, regularly renewed by the Research Institute for the Hygiene and Health Protection of Children and Adolescents and mostly relating to separate decades of the 20th century. The intensity of the secular trends was assessed through the analysis of scatter plots. The largest share in the secular increase of bodily dimensions belongs to intense growth during the second year of life and during the adolescent growth spurt. The smallest share is that of intrauterine growth, limited by the mother’s body size, and that of growth during adolescence, when the mature body size has been virtually reached and growth rate is minimal. Boys, who are more eco-sensitive, demonstrate greater secular changes than girls, who are eco-resistant. Smaller secular changes in weight than in height in both boys and girls result in the increase of leptosomy. This heterochrony concerns mostly newborns, whose body mass is a standard example of stabilizing selection.