Abstract
The sternal end of the clavicle has been illustrated to be useful in aging young adults, however, no studies have investigated what age-related changes occur to the sternal end post epiphyseal fusion. In this study, three morphological features (i.e., surface topography, porosity, and osteophyte formation) were examined and scored using 564 clavicles of individuals of European ancestry (n = 318 males; n = 246 females), with known ages of 40+ years, from four documented skeletal collections: Hamann-Todd, Pretoria, St. Bride's, and Coimbra. An ordinal scoring method was developed for each of the three traits. Surface topography showed the strongest correlation with age, and composite scores (formed by summing the three separate trait scores) indicated progressive degeneration of the surface with increasing chronological age. Linear regression analyses were performed on the trait scores to produce pooled-sample age estimation equations. Blind tests of the composite score method and regression formulae on 56 individuals, aged 40+ years, from Christ Church Spitalfields, suggest accuracies of 96.4% for both methods.These preliminary results display the first evidence of the utility of the sternal end of the clavicle in aging older adult individuals. However, in the current format, these criteria should only be applied to individuals already identified as over 40 years in order to refine the age ranges used for advanced age. These findings do suggest the sternal end of the clavicle has potential to aid age estimates beyond the traditional “mature adult” age category (i.e., 46+ years), and provides several suggestions for future research. Am J Phys Anthropol 156:203–214, 2015. © 2014 The Authors American Journal of Physical Anthropology Published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Highlights
These preliminary results display the first evidence of the utility of the sternal end of the clavicle in aging older adult individuals
The sternal end of the clavicle has been illustrated to be useful in aging young adults, no studies have investigated what age-related changes occur to the sternal end post epiphyseal fusion
Surface topography showed the strongest correlation with age, and composite scores indicated progressive degeneration of the surface with increasing chronological age
Summary
These preliminary results display the first evidence of the utility of the sternal end of the clavicle in aging older adult individuals. By using a catch-all age bracket of 461 years for all “older adults”, archaeological age distributions do not accurately represent the record of older-aged adults This can lead to the assumption that archaeological individuals regularly died at an earlier age than modern humans, despite historical documents, art, sculptures, and gravestones provide evidence to the contrary. Several macroscopic aging techniques do allow for the assessment of age beyond 46 years (e.g., sternal end of the 4th rib, the auricular surface of the ilium, pubic symphysis) Such methods track progressive degenerative changes from the late teens, until the observations reach their peak breakdown and plateau, most commonly between 50 and 60 years (I. scan et al, 1984a,b, 1985; Lovejoy et al, 1985; Brooks and Suchey, 1990; Buckberry and Chamberlain, 2002). 30 39 59 61 57 246 67.9 40295 do not provide the criteria for further demarcation past this maximum age, resulting in the inability to identify the very old (i.e., 701 years)
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