A Cross-Sectional Study of Body Weight among the Nath Boys of Kamrup District, Assam

Abstract

Anthropologists have traditionally been associated with the study of human physical growth. One of the main objectives of physical growth study in Biological anthropology is to understand the process of human evolution and the cause of human variation.

The purpose of present paper is to describe the body weight as a somatometric character of 430 Nath boys of Kamrup District, Assam. For this present study the boys of 8 years to 18 years of age group were measured. All the data were arranged in 11 different age groups in the class intervals of one year. The present study is confined to the Nath inhabited three villages named, Changsari, Maniari and Dalang of Kamrup District, Assam. Here an attempt has been made to study the adolescent growth spurt, percentage of growth per annum and level of maturity in body weight among the Nath boys. An attempt has also made to compare the present data with the Indian rural boys (ICMR, 1989) and National Centre for Health Statistics (NCHS).