Human Skull - Sexual Dimorphism

The human skull has been shown to exhibit remarkable sex differences and considered as a valuable indicator of sex for adult human skeleton. We utilized 100 (male - 66, female - 34) dried human skulls obtained from the Department of anatomy, Sri Venkateswara Medical College and Department of anthropology, Sri Venkateswara University, Tirupati. We measured 15 different parameters of the skull to study the sexual dimorphism of the human skull by using spreading and sliding callipers. We observed higher mean values in males when compared to females in all variables. Difference between two sexes was observed in 11 variables i.e. maximum cranial length, maximum cranial breadth, maximum bizygomatic diameter, basion-prosthion length, basion-nasion length, bregma-lambda length, mastoid length, foramen magnum length, foramen magnum breadth, palatal length and palatal length which were statistically significant (p < 0.01). Our study result analysis showed that the employed variables can discriminate both sexes by 85%. Identification of sexual dimorphism may also helpful to forensic experts to establish identity of diseased persons.