Department of Anthropology, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA 70118, USA.
Am J Phys Anthropol. 2010 Jun;142(2):287-302. doi: 10.1002/ajpa.21226.
Given the well-documented fact that human body proportions covary with climate (presumably due to the action of selection), one would expect that the Ipiutak and Tigara Inuit samples from Point Hope, Alaska, would be characterized by an extremely cold-adapted body shape. Comparison of the Point Hope Inuit samples to a large (n > 900) sample of European and European-derived, African and African-derived, and Native American skeletons (including Koniag Inuit from Kodiak Island, Alaska) confirms that the Point Hope Inuit evince a cold-adapted body form, but analyses also reveal some unexpected results. For example, one might suspect that the Point Hope samples would show a more cold-adapted body form than the Koniag, given their more extreme environment, but this is not the case. Additionally, univariate analyses seldom show the Inuit samples to be more cold-adapted in body shape than Europeans, and multivariate cluster analyses that include a myriad of body shape variables such as femoral head diameter, bi-iliac breadth, and limb segment lengths fail to effectively separate the Inuit samples from Europeans. In fact, in terms of body shape, the European and the Inuit samples tend to be cold-adapted and tend to be separated in multivariate space from the more tropically adapted Africans, especially those groups from south of the Sahara.
鉴于人体比例与气候密切相关这一事实（可能是由于选择的作用），人们会预期来自阿拉斯加希望角的伊皮塔克和提拉加因纽特人的样本具有极其适应寒冷的体型。将希望角因纽特人的样本与来自欧洲和欧洲后裔、非洲和非洲后裔以及美洲原住民的大量（n > 900）骨骼样本进行比较（包括来自阿拉斯加科迪亚克岛的科尼亚格因纽特人），证实了希望角因纽特人具有适应寒冷的体型，但分析也揭示了一些意想不到的结果。例如，人们可能会怀疑希望角的样本由于环境更为极端，会比科尼亚格因纽特人表现出更适应寒冷的体型，但事实并非如此。此外，单变量分析很少表明因纽特人的体型比欧洲人更适应寒冷，并且包括股骨头部直径、髂骨宽度和肢体长度等众多体型变量的多元聚类分析未能有效地将因纽特人的样本与欧洲人区分开来。事实上，就体型而言，欧洲人和因纽特人的样本往往适应寒冷，并且在多元空间中与更适应热带的非洲人，特别是撒哈拉以南的那些群体，分离。
