Finger ridge-count variability in Sub-Saharan Africa

Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
Mean finger ridge-count data were obtained, primarily from literature sources, for 31 male and 24 female human sub-Saharan African samples. The 10 finger ridge-counts and total ridge-count were used as independent variables in a multiple regression analysis, latitude and longitude serving as the dependent variables. It is apparently not the magnitude of the ridge-counts that is important, but rather contrasts between groups of digits. The most important geographically patterned variation in ridge-counts consisted of contrasts between digits 4 and 5 and digits 2 and 3. South and southeast African populations were characterized by low contrasts, west Africans by high contrasts and southwest Africans were intermediate. The geographical patterning of the contrast agreed well with known patterns of gene flow into and within the continent as determined by serological genes. Principal components analysis was carried out to determine whether within-group components corresponding to the geographically relevant between-group variation could be identified. The 3rd, 4th and 5th components drew the same types of contrasts between the groups of digits identified in the multiple regression analysis, but they were relatively unimportant. The geographically important principal components would be overlooked in a traditional multivariate analysis of finger ridge-counts, since the analysis would be dominated by pattern size. Finger ridge-counts are potentially very useful in population studies, but account must be taken of their multicomponent nature.

This publication has 15 references indexed in Scilit: