Sexual dimorphism in base of skull.

Sex determination is an important task in forensic medicine and physical anthropology. The aims of this study were to assess the presence of sexual dimorphism in the base of the skull and to compare the accuracy of sex estimation by this method with that achieved in other metric studies of this region. The sample comprised 109 individuals (53 males and 56 females) of known sex, age, and cause of death from San José cemetery in Granada (Spain). Six dimensions were analyzed and discriminant function analysis was performed. The discriminant capacity of the selected variables was then evaluated by using a cross-validation procedure. All dimensions were significantly higher in males than in females. The percentage accuracy was 75.7% (77.8% for males and 73.7% for females). Highest dimorphic values were for occipital condyle length and foramen magnum width. Skull base measurements should only serve to corroborate findings.