Johnson J S
J Anat. 1976 Jul;121(Pt 3):475-84.
Available methods of estimating the ages of unknown skulls are notoriously inaccurate. Making use of a unique opportunity to view several hundreds of remains from two nineteenth century cemeteries, various methods of estimating age were tested. A statistical method which gives relative weighting to each age indicator before reducing the data to a single pooled age estimate was found to be the most reliable. The greater the number of criteria which were utilized for age estimation, the more highly correlated was the estimated age of remains with the actual age at death. The degree of accuracy in estimating the ages of skulls of under 20 years was relatively high, when only the stage of development of dental tissues was examined. With increasing age over 20 the accuracy decreased, particularly at ages over 45. The range of age distribution of skulls estimated from published data on suture closure tended to be more restricted than that which may acutally occur.
众所周知，现有的估算未知头骨年龄的方法极不准确。利用一个独特的机会，研究了来自两个19世纪墓地的数百具遗骸，对各种估算年龄的方法进行了测试。发现一种统计方法在将数据简化为单一汇总年龄估计之前，对每个年龄指标给予相对权重，这种方法最为可靠。用于年龄估计的标准数量越多，遗骸的估计年龄与实际死亡年龄的相关性就越高。当仅检查牙齿组织的发育阶段时，20岁以下头骨年龄估计的准确性相对较高。随着年龄超过20岁，准确性下降，尤其是在45岁以上。根据已发表的缝合线闭合数据估算的头骨年龄分布范围往往比实际可能出现的范围更窄。
