Young White Males Research Articles

Suicide and Schizophrenia: A Review of Literature for the Decade (1990-1999) and Implications for Mental Health Nursing

This paper presents an overview of recent evidence on general and specific risk factors for suicide in patients with schizophrenia. The authors highlight the significant factors contributing to the likelihood of suicide in patients diagnosed with schizophrenia. This information will enhance the delivery of nursing care to these patients in all health care settings. A review of literature was conducted by two methods of investigation: Medline and CINAHL search and a manual search through articles from 1990 to 1999. The lifetime risk of committing suicide is estimated at about 9-13% of persons with schizophrenia, and it is 20 to 50 times higher than that in the general population. Young white males diagnosed with schizophrenia who are depressed, unmarried, unemployed, socially isolated, and functionally impaired and who lack external support are the most vulnerable in the early stages of schizophrenic illness. Findings can be instrumental in identifying and treating patients who are most vulnerable and in making psychiatric nurses aware of the scenarios and critical stages of the disease process when suicide is most likely to occur.

Why Do Good Kids Do Bad Things? Considering Multiple Contexts in the Study of Antisocial Fighting Behaviors in African American Urban Youth

This study aims to identify which contexts are related to antisocial fighting behaviors in African American adolescents. Eighty-eight urban high school students (75% female; ages 14 to 18) participated in a study aimed to assess the relation between their social contexts (family, neighborhood, peers, and school) and fighting behaviors. Results supported the hypothesized relation between negative peer influence and antisocial fighting behaviors. As expected, the combination of all 4 negative contexts was directly related to fighting behaviors. Additionally, males behaved more aggressively than females. Suggestions are offered for future research concerning the influence of extended kin on antisocial fighting behaviors in this population. Understanding precursors to juvenile delinquency is an important and timely topic. Recent years have witnessed a punitive stance towards youth and juvenile justice policy (Bortner, Zatz, & Hawkins, 2000). Furthermore, policies for harsher penalties and juvenile incarceration, as well as other forms of social control, have been on a sharp rise (Krisberg et al., 1987; Snyder & Sickmund, 1995). However, the effects of these public policies have not fallen equally among all youth involved in the juvenile justice system. African American and Hispanic American youth are candidates most likely to be detained and confined in secure facilities (Krisberg et al., 1987; Snyder & Sickmund, 1995). What is needed is information about precursors to events that lead youth to participation in the juvenile justice system. For example, researchers have documented how African American adolescents have been impacted by negative perceptions of them by community and school officials (Cunningham, 1999; Ford, 2001, 1998; Irvine, 1990). These negative perceptions of youth often lead to internal and external coping responses that are precursors to involvement in the juvenile justice system (Spencer, Cunningham, & Swanson, 1995; Stevenson, 1997). One external response is fighting behaviors. Antisocial fighting behaviors are a regular occurrence in many urban environments. Because they often occur out of the presence of responsible adults, fighting behaviors have long been considered unavoidable and harmful parts of growing up in these environments. Identifying the characteristics of youth who display these behaviors is important in order to minimize the growth of youth violence and potential juvenile justice system involvement. The majority of available literature on this topic, however, often exposes the characteristics of young White males while overlooking females and minority populations entirely (Brame, Nagin, & Tremblay, 2001; Nagin & Tremblay, 1999). When researching African American urban youth, methodology developed for the study of White children should not be generalized. Although development probably progresses similarly across different racial populations, researchers must consider the interaction between individuals and their unique environments. Therefore, understanding the development of minority youth requires precise attention to the unique situations these youth face (Garcia Coll et al., 1996). All individuals develop within a variety of environmental contexts, which in turn, influence how they will respond to various stimuli. One response method is adaptive coping, which is how individuals meet significant threats to stability and function effectively (Anthony, 1974). Antisocial fighting behaviors, for instance, may be adaptive coping mechanisms utilized by many urban youth, although these behaviors have maladaptive connotations, which lead to increased involvement with the juvenile justice system. Not all youth within these communities display these behaviors, however. For example, Spencer (1995, 1999) demonstrated that many African American adolescents sharing the same environment commonly had different outcomes as far as behavioral resilience. Her research findings complimented the work of other researchers who have argued that adolescents who display resilience positively adapt within adverse contexts (Luthar, Cicchetti, & Becker, 2000). …

When White Boys Kill

The image of male youth homicide is primarily associated with young black males. However, recent school shootings in which multiple innocent victims were murdered indicate that young white males may be at serious risk of a much more tragic homicidal phenomenon known as multicide. This paper offers a conceptual framework to explain multicide and violence generally among young white males by employing an Afrocentric analysis. This analysis assumes that multicide among young white males can be explained by the convergence of three structural-cultural factors, which are (1) the concept of manhood that places considerable emphasis on physical aggression; (2) the phenomenon of spiritual alienation; and (3) the anxiety and stress associated with concerns over maintaining white male privilege. The paper also presents recommendations that describe how the effects of these three factors could be prevented and mediated, and it offers suggestions for future research that applies an Afrocentric framework to investigate young, white male violence.

Exploring young men's drinking using the AUDIT questionnaire.

This paper reports the findings of an AUDIT questionnaire administered to a sample of young (16-24-year-old) white males. Of the sample, 65% were drinking at potentially harmful levels. Averaging 45 U/week, 18-21 years was the age of highest alcohol consumption. Compared with 16-17- and 22-24-year-olds, this group recorded the highest proportion of hazardous drinkers and most negative consequences of drinking.

Body composition of a young, multiethnic, male population

The study objective was to establish the range of total body-composition values for a young, multiethnic, healthy male population (aged 3-18 y) by using dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA). Results for 297 males in three ethnic groups [European American (white), n = 145; African American (black), n = 78; and Mexican American (Hispanic), n = 74] are reported. Bone mineral content (BMC), lean tissue mass (LTM), body fat mass, and percentage fat are presented as functions of age. Analysis of variance with age, weight, and height as covariates was used to evaluate differences among the three ethnic groups. BMC and LTM were higher in black than in white males, but no difference in BMC or LTM was evident between the white and Hispanic groups. The relation between total-body BMC and LTM was linear (r = 0.985, P < 0.0001) and independent of age or ethnic classification. The Hispanic males had higher body fat values than the white group, whereas the black males generally had lower values than the white group. When adjusted for body size, the Hispanic males continued to have significantly higher body fat and percentage fat than the white or black males. Ethnic-specific equations for the prediction of body composition as a function of age, weight, and height were derived. The results for the white males in the present study were compared with DXA-derived reference data reported in other countries for young white males. We conclude that reference values of total body composition for young healthy males need to be ethnic specific.

Suicide by age, ethnic group, coroners' verdicts and country of birth. A three-year survey in inner London.

Information on suicide in ethnic and immigrant groups in England and Wales is limited. A three-year (1991-1993) survey was conducted of all unnatural deaths of residents of an urban area. 'True likely' and 'official' age-adjusted suicide rates were compared by ethnicity and, for Whites, birthplace. Irrespective of verdict, 329 likely suicides were identified. Relatively few ethnic minority and White immigrant suicides had received a suicide verdict. Afro-Caribbeans had relatively low, and young Indian women relatively high suicide rates. Rates of Scottish- and Irish-born residents were 2.1 to 2.9 times higher than the local base rate. Young White males' rates were higher than those of the elderly. Classification of suicide is biased with respect to ethnicity and national origin. Rate patterns for ethnic minority groups reflect patterns seen in attempted suicide. In this deprived area, young White male suicide rates have surpassed those among the old.

Skill School Boys: Masculine Identity Formation Among White Boys in an Urban High School Vocational Autoshop Program

Through interviews and observations, I explore how a group of white working-class boys who have family traditions in auto repair construct notions of masculinity in a public-vocational-school autoshop class in Buffalo, New York. Many of the students in this group say that they plan to open their own garages on graduation. Although there are many facets to the production of a sense of manhood, I focus on the ways in which young white males in a restructuring economy narrate a sense of self grounded in the area of work on a multiethnic shopfloor—a sphere which they ultimately coconstruct around notions of the racially deviant “other.” At present, there is not a lot of literature on identity formation processes among youth who are trained in school to become trades-people, particularly in relation to jobs that are typically coded “male.”

Influence of demographic variables in prehospital treatment of patients with chest pain

Objective. To determine whether the number of interventions requested by EMS personnel for patients with acute, nontraumatic chest pain varied with the patient's gender or race.Methods. The authors conducted a retrospective chart review of the care requested for patients 17 years old or older complaining of acute, nontraumatic chest pain by one EMS squad in a city of 50,000 people over a six-month period. Interventions recorded for each patient included oxygen administration, artificial airway placement, intravenous fluid administration, defibrillation, and use of lidocaine and nitroglycerin.Results. Of the 169 patients in this study, 54% (n = 92) were white and 56% (n = 95) were female. Age was missing for two patients; of the remainder, 75% (n = 127) were 40 years old or older. The numbers of interventions requested ranged from 0 to 4. EMS personnel requested supplemental oxygen for 163 patients. 81% of the females had IV lines placed or attempted, compared with 70% of the males; EMS personnel requested orders for nitroglycerin for 43% of the females and 29% of the males. Whites were more likely than nonwhites to have requests for IV lines or nitroglycerin. Overall, the numbers of interventions were similar among young females and among older patients, regardless of race or gender. The pattern for young males was different, with significantly more requests for interventions for young white males than for young nonwhite males (1.89 vs 1.34).Conclusions. Among older patients and among young females, EMS personnel requested similar numbers of interventions for patients complaining of acute, nontraumatic chest pain regardless of patient race. Patterns of care appeared to differ for young males, a finding that warrants further study.

BODY COMPOSITION AND CHILDHOOD OBESITY

Underwater weighing has been the gold standard for the measurement of body composition in humans; however, the two formulas widely used, the Siri and Bronze, were developed using young adult white males. The development of newer techniques in the past 20 years has greatly expanded the accuracy and ease of measuring body composition. These methods have improved the ability to model relationships between body compartments. This article reviews the compartmental models and then critiques the methods available to measure body composition.

Fatal occupational falls in the U.S. construction industry, 1980–1989

Death certificate analyses were conducted on all fatal occupational falls occurring between 1980 and 1989 in the United States' construction industry using the National Traumatic Occupational Fatalities surveillance system at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, Division of Safety Research. Fatality rates were calculated by geographic location (region and state), and year of injury. From 1980 to 1989, there were 2798 deaths due to occupational falls in construction, representing 49.6% of all fatal occupational falls across all industries. Most of these incidents occurred among young white males. By geographical location, the highest fatality rates were observed within the subregions of the Southern states in the United States. In observing the time between the date of injury and the date of death, 66% of the fall victims died on the same day as the injury, whereas 5.7% lived more than 90 days before dying. Further research needs to be targeted at what occupations are at highest risk for a fall injury, what circumstances are attributable to these falls, and prevention strategies to reduce fall injuries and fatalities. Research is also needed to explain why there are geographic differences in occupational falls in the construction industry.

Nonfatal occupational fall injuries in the West Virginia construction industry

Descriptive analyses were conducted using the West Virginia workers' compensation and supplemental injury records to assess nonfatal occupational falls from elevated work surfaces in the construction industry. These analyses are based on the 182 fall injuries reported to the State workers' compensation during fiscal year 1991 for which there were complete supplemental injury data. County-specific injury rates were calculated for counties with six or more fall injuries. Most of these incidents occurred among young white males who were employed as either craftsmen and kindred workers (48%) or laborers (33%) on non-union jobs in the general construction category (SIC-15). The counties with the highest injury rates that exceed the State rate of 5.9 per 1000 construction workers were located around or near the major industrial areas of Kanawha and Monongalia counties. Of the 182 claimants in the study population, one-third had been employed in their occupation for 2 years or less. For 60% of the claimants, the length of employment with the company for which they were employed at the time of the fall injury was two years or less; 26% had been employed for six months or less. Approximately, 63% of the 182 claimants had received some type of fall protection training. Ladders and scaffolds were involved in 50% of all falls. Fall protection devices were not commonly used by the 182 construction workers who worked from elevated surfaces. Fifty percent of the claimants were using tools or handling materials when the fall occurred. Fifty-nine percent of the falls occurred from elevated work surfaces which were relatively low heights (⩽ 10 feet) where few safety regulations apply even though the potential for a serious injury still exists.

HIV/AIDS and Suicide: Further Precautions

The news on HIV/AIDS remains grim. Despite vast efforts at research and considerable sums supporting care, a cure remains elusive. Glimmers of hope for more effective treatments and for vaccines help those whose lives are affected move forward to face new challenges. Yet the statistics stagger the imagination. For young men in their 20s and 30s, AIDS is the leading cause of death. Approximately 1 percent of young white males, 3 percent of young African American males, 1.5 percent of young Hispanic males, and 1 percent of young African American females are estimated to be infected with HIV (Rosenberg, 1995). For gay men, a generation faces extinction. The Presidential Commission on AIDS characterized the public response as one of apathy. Within the social work profession, it is more than apathy - it is also immobilization and perhaps compassion fatigue. It comes as little surprise that the criticism of the findings on HIV and suicide comes from one obviously seasoned in the trenches of the struggle to fight AIDS. It is not surprising that some care and some are willing to struggle with the pandemic's impact on those searching for meaning in life despite overwhelming odds. It is not surprising that some feel that the discussion of suicide risk from a mental health perspective is linked to a discussion of a exit. Suicide can be a rational choice, especially if one faces a painful, stigmatized, and frightening death. Some, such as the Samaritans (Varah, 1985), have led the effort to be supportive when one makes final suicide choices. The Samaritan model is not rejected by the latest NASW policy on assisted suicide, nor should it be, despite the complex legal and ethical morass in which such decisions are embedded. However, how much of the impetus for support of this policy is influenced by lingering despair within the helping professions? Social workers on the front line of the HIV/AIDS pandemic need support, direction, and training. Are schools of social work facing up to this challenge in their curriculum offerings? Has NASW re-established its HIV/AIDS chapter liaisons? Social workers in unconscionably high numbers report an unwillingness to work with people affected by HIV/AIDS and a lack of training in HIV/AIDS (NASW Task Force on HIV/AIDS, 1995). Some social workers who have for so long carried the burden of care see no relief in sight, see little help from their profession, see the anguish that only worsens, see funds stagnate as the number of infected people grows, and see the most vulnerable of society ravaged. Some perhaps feel that self-deliverance is all too rational. Some who witness young, seemingly healthy men and women sit on death watch feel immobilized. …

Favorable Self-Selection and the Internal Migration of Young White Males in the United States

This study offers an alternative empirical technique to test whether the favorable self-selection hypothesis applies to internal migrants in the United States. Our empirical specification attempts to determine if prospective migrants possess unobserved traits such as higher ability or motivation which influence their earnings potential relative to nonmigrants. Using NLSY [National Longitudinal Survey of Youth] data for 1985 through 1991 we find some support for the favorable self-selection hypothesis for white males who move from one SMSA to another. Prior to their move prospective migrants enjoy a consistent advantage in annual wage and salary income relative to nonmigrants with similar earnings-related characteristics. (EXCERPT)

Pharmacokinetics of Methylprednisolone in Elderly and Young Healthy Males

To characterize and compare the pharmacokinetics of a single intravenous dose of methylprednisolone in elderly and young healthy males. A randomized, parallel pharmacokinetic trial. A public university-affiliated hospital. Seven healthy, elderly white males (aged 69 to 82 years) and five healthy, young white males (aged 24 to 37 years) who gave informed consent and fulfilled all screening criteria. Serial blood samples were obtained over a 24-hour study period after intravenous administration of a 10-mg dose of methylprednisolone. Serum methylprednisolone concentrations were determined by high performance liquid chromatography and utilized to determine the pharmacokinetic parameters. Methylprednisolone serum concentrations declined in a linear manner in both groups. However, 4 hours after the dose, the mean serum concentration of methylprednisolone was 50.9 +/- 15.1 ng/mL in the elderly group and 37.6 +/- 7.5 (P = 0.07) ng/mL in the young group. The clearance of methylprednisolone was 237 +/- 62 mL/h/kg, with a volume of distribution of 1.10 +/- 0.07 L/kg, for the elderly group, whereas the young males had a mean drug clearance of 359 +/- 90 mL/h/kg (P < 0.05) and a mean volume of distribution of 1.28 +/- 0.34 L/kg. The half-life of methylprednisolone ranged from 1.90 to 5.40 hours in the elderly group; the range was 1.99 to 3.31 hour (P = 0.016) in the young group. A slower methylprednisolone clearance was noted in the elderly group compared with the young counterparts. This pharmacokinetic alteration seen in healthy elderly subjects may contribute to the increased incidence of adverse effects from chronic glucocorticoid therapy that has been observed among elderly patients.

Renal hemodynamics and cardiovascular reactivity in the prehypertensive stage.

To examine whether sympathetic nervous activation has an impact on renal circulation in subjects at risk for high blood pressure, we assessed renal hemodynamics and cardiovascular response to mental stress in 40 healthy young white males, 12 normotensive subjects without and 14 with familial hypertension, and 14 with borderline hypertension. The response of systolic and diastolic blood pressure to mental stress was assessed while each patient performed a mental arithmetic task; this was taken as the parameter for the activation of the sympathetic nervous system. Renal plasma flow was measured by para-aminohippuric acid clearance under steady-state conditions. In parallel, glomerular filtration rate as a parameter for functional impairment of the kidneys was determined by creatinine clearance, and filtration fraction was also calculated. Patients with borderline hypertension were characterized by a reduced renal blood flow and increased filtration fraction in comparison with both normotensive groups. The increase in systolic blood pressure during mental stress was more pronounced in borderline hypertensives. We observed no significant difference in renal hemodynamics and cardiovascular response to mental stress between normotensives with and without a family history of hypertension. In the total population, cardiovascular response to mental stress was correlated with renal hemodynamics: The greater the increase in systolic blood pressure during mental stress, the lower was the renal plasma flow and the greater the filtration fraction. Thus, renal plasma flow was found to be already reduced and filtration fraction increased before sustained hypertension developed. Because this pattern in renal hemodynamics was related to cardiovascular response to mental stress, our data suggest that sympathetic activation already appeared to affect renal hemodynamics at the onset of essential hypertension.

City of Brotherly Hate

The city of Philadelphia is known as the City of Brotherly Love, but for black people in the nineteenth century this was not the case. Between 1832 and 1849 the tranquility of Philadelphia was shattered by five major and numerous smaller interracial battles.' White mobs called terrorizing the city's black population hunting the nigs.2 As Roger Lane argued in his earlier book, Roots of Violence in Black Philadelphia, 1860-1900, antiblack violence in Philadelphia constituted a particular type of urban disorder. In a city where rival gangs of young white males regularly battled for turf, assaults on blacks cut across class, gender, and age lines. I mention this book because it must be read with Lane's William Dorsey's Philadelphia and Ours. Together these two studies present the most ambitious, detailed, and provocative analysis of urban northern postbellum black life in print. In brief, the Dorsey volume is a welcome addition to and revision of W. E. B. Du Bois' classic study, The Philadelphia Negro (1899). In Roots of Violence in Black Philadelphia, Lane dealt with the unique problem of criminality in black Philadelphia during the last forty years of the nineteenth century (p. 3). This was a strong thesis-driven book that examined the consequences of blacks' failure to enter the urban industrial order. William Dorsey's Philadelphia is a more complex and detailed exploration of this same problem. The new book details the interaction of blacks and whites in postCivil War Philadelphia and examines the institutions black people created to sustain themselves in a hostile environment. William Dorsey's Philadelphia shows that blacks never passive victims of white supremacy. Even though they possessed limited resources and often faced defeats in their quest for equality, the Negro citizens of Philadelphia were more inclined to emphasize progress than pain (p. 309). But having said this I think it should be noted that Lane presents a subtle and nuanced analysis of black inequality in the Quaker City. According to Lane, black deprivation after the Civil War

Apo B insertion/deletion polymorphisms are associated with atherosclerosis in young black but not young white males. Pathobiological Determinants of Atherosclerosis in Youth (PDAY) Research Group.

Investigators in eight communities collected aortas, right coronary arteries, blood and liver samples, and associated information from 872 young males, aged 15-34 years, who died of external causes. Pathologists graded the arteries for atherosclerotic lesions, and a central laboratory measured lipoprotein cholesterol concentrations. Apolipoprotein (apo) B sequences were amplified in hepatic DNA samples to determine genotypes for length polymorphisms in the signal peptide of apo B. In addition to the insertion (ins) allele (27-amino acid signal peptide) and the deletion (del) allele (24 amino acids), we detected a rare allele (ins*) in whites with an in-frame insertion of two Leu codons in a region that normally contains six Leu codons. The frequency for the apo B del allele was lower in blacks than in whites (p less than 0.0001). In blacks, homozygotes for the ins allele had the lowest levels of serum cholesterol and very low plus low density lipoprotein cholesterol (VLDL + LDL-C), homozygotes for the del allele had the highest levels, and heterozygotes had intermediate levels (p = 0.0509 for cholesterol, p = 0.0530 for VLDL + LDL-C), but no differences were found in whites. In blacks, homozygotes for the ins allele had the least involvement of the thoracic and the abdominal aorta with lesions, homozygotes for the del allele had the greatest involvement, and heterozygotes had intermediate involvement (p = 0.0328 for thoracic aorta, p = 0.0104 for abdominal aorta), but no differences were found in whites.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Race unconsciousness and the white male

D uring the past twenty years, a combination of cultural, social, and political factors produced a powerful taboo deflecting attention from affirmative action's effects upon young, working and middle-class white males. This massive "race unconsciousness" effectively devictimized them. Protests and grievances voiced by white males were ignored or jeered by influential individuals and institutions. Ironically, in a society dominated by a white-male power structure, few powerful white males concerned themselves with the fate of younger, workingand middle-class white males under affirmative action. Exploring the structural matrix and the ideological roots of this institutional inattention is the aim of this analysis. Race-unconsciousness toward white males has crippled the formulation, implementation and assessment of race-conscious programs. Whether or not journalists, social scientists, and policy makers acknowledge the white males' responses to affirmative action, the sociological and political consequences are significant. Intellectual self-censorship and devictimization of any class of human beings are ominous developments in societies committed to individual rights, democratic processes and the free exchange of ideas. How censorship develops among the highly-educated classes of a post-industrial society merits investigation.

Race and gender differences in serum lipoproteins of children, adolescents, and young adults—Emergence of an adverse lipoprotein pattern in white males: The Bogalusa Heart Study

Methods. Serum lipoprotein profiles in 4,231 individuals, ages 5–26 years, were studied cross-sectionally in a biracial community to describe the race- and gender-specific changes from adolescence into young adulthood. Results. White children and adolescents of both genders showed significantly higher covariates—adjusted triglycerides (9–11 mg/dl) and very-low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (1–2 mg/dl)—and lower total cholesterol (3–14 mg/dl) and high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (6–10 mg/dl) levels than their black counterparts. These black-white differences persisted among young adults of both genders with the exception of total cholesterol levels (higher triglycerides: 23–32 mg/dl; higher very-low-density lipoprotein cholesterol: 5–7 mg/dl; lower high-density lipoprotein cholesterol: 9–11 mg/dl); in addition, white young adult males began to show higher levels of low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (14 mg/dl) than black young adult males. A consistent gender-related pattern emerged only among white young adults with males showing higher triglyceride levels (22 mg/dl), very-low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (5 mg/dl), and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (10 mg/dl) and lower high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (10 mg/dl) than females. Lipoprotein changes from adolescence into young adulthood were more pronounced among white males than other race-gender groups, resulting in higher triglyceride, very-low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, a higher total cholesterol/high-density lipoprotein cholesterol ratio, and a lower high-density lipoprotein cholesterol in their young adulthood. According to the National Cholesterol Education Program criteria, a relatively higher proportion of young adult white males was classified as borderline-high (22.6%) or high (9.1%) for low-density lipoprotein cholesterol. Adiposity was the major contributor to the adverse lipoprotein pattern, especially among white males. Sexual maturation and age influenced the lipoprotein levels to a greater extent among white males. Cigarette smoking, alcohol intake, and oral contraceptive use began to emerge as minor but significant factors contributing to the lipoprotein levels in adolescents and young adults. Conclusion. These results underscore the desirability of early targeting for primary prevention.

Relationships between lung function and physical characteristics in young adult black and white males and females

The relationships of lung function to physical characteristics in young adults have not been adequately described for different gender-race groups in the United States. As part of a study of the effects of ozone exposure upon Black and White men and women, we measured lung volumes, expiratory flow rates, and airways resistance on a sample of 314 healthy 18-35 yr old nonsmokers. Regression analysis indicated that lung function was adequately described as a linear function of either height or sitting height in each of the four groups, and that while not always significant, gender and race differences in the height and sitting height coefficients were consistently present with those of males and Whites larger than those of females and Blacks, respectively. Lung volumes were frequently observed to be associated with body mass index as measured by Quetelet Index (weight.height.2). The best fitting gender-race specific multiple regression models including these terms and occasional age terms are presented. Two additional models are presented, one of which simultaneously adjusts for both gender and race, and the other of which adjusts for gender for a given race. Comparison of predicted values from our study to those of other studies suggests that the population samples from this study may be similar to those of other American populations reported upon by others.