Sex determination using metacarpal biometric data from the Athens Collection

Abstract

Forensic anthropologists and bioarchaeologists usually determine sex by analyzing quantitative and qualitative characters of the human skeleton. In general, the pelvis and skull are the skeletal parts used most often, but in many cases these parts are missing or fragmentary. In such circumstances, it is necessary to use techniques based on other skeletal elements. The primary aim of this work is to determine whether metacarpals can be used for the determination of sex specifically in a Greek population. A secondary step is to describe and develop linear discriminant function equations for sex determination based on a contemporary Greek population using metacarpal biometric data. The skeletal sample of the modern Greeks is housed at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA) is comprised of 993 metacarpals (left and right), corresponding to 151 adult individuals (84 males and 67 females). The correct sex classification reached an accuracy of 83.7–88.1% for left and 83.8–89.7%, for right metacarpals. Our results suggest that metacarpals can be used for sexing in bioarchaeological, and forensic studies, in addition to other sex determination techniques.