IB MATHEMATIC STUDIES COURSEWORK

IB Mathematic Studies Coursework

IB Mathematic Studies Coursework

Introduction

The anatomic parameters of human body such as height, weight and the size of some specific parts of it have been thoroughly studied in literature for various purposes. However, it seems that the correlation between some of those parameters in order to estimate human height and weight has not been studied in particular.(Coughlin,2003)

The development of the human foot and the age in which its size approaches that of the mature human skeleton constitute points of interest. The acquisition of the mean values and of the standard deviations of those variables might be useful in treating surgical pathologies such as talipes equinavarus, flat foot or varus metatarsal. and other familiar or acquired abnormalities in a way that it can help making a treatment decision.(Ozden,2005)

Methods

The team of participating examiners

The team of the participating examiners consisted of the research team and of the “Thriassio” general hospital health visitors department. The teachers of the children may contribute to that last process occasionally, depending on the situation. The participation of female health visitors facilitated the participation of older girls. The health visitors also helped the younger pupils who couldn't self serve.

The material

The schools that the investigation team was authorised to visit were 90 primary and 36 high schools with a total of 21,234 students in various municipalities near Thriassio Hospital, Elefsina, Attica, Greece. This an urban, industrialized suburb not far away (20 km) from Athens.

The sample size was assessed prior to the start of the study by power analysis which showed that a number of 4203 participants would be adequate to detect two-sided mean differences of 0.5% in foot length and could achieve statistical power 90% at a probability level of 0.05. In addition, the authors increased this number by 25% to a total of 5254 in order to counter for potential low response. The sample should also follow the age and sex distribution according to national census,in order to be representative of the population studied.

Results

The sample of the study consisted of 5093 children (2535 boys, 49.77%, 2558 girls, 50.23%). The response ratio was 96.93%. The average age of the sample was 11.47 ± 2.71 years.

The descriptive statistics such as the means and standard deviations for the dependent variables (height, weight) as well as the independent variables (age, right foot length, left foot length) are classified by sex and are shown in Table 1. According to the results, a significant difference was found in right and left foot length between the two genders. The age, height and weight did not differ significantly.

Table 1.

Descriptive statistics of the main characteristics of the study and comparisons between sexes

Sex

Boys

Girls

Mean

SD

Min

Max

Mean

SD

Min

Max

p-Value

Age (years)

11.37

2.69

5.49

20.06

11.36

2.73

5.99

18.46

0.989

Height (cm)

147.44

16.78

105.00

202.00

146.80

14.49

107.00

183.00

0.145

Weight (Kg)

45.04

16.77

17.00

119.00

44.79

14.44

16.00

109.00

0.573

Left foot length (cm)

22.50

2.54

16.00

29.00

21.71

2.01

15.00

29.00

<0.001

Right foot length (cm)

22.43

2.56

15.00

28.00

21.71

2.01

15.00

27.00

<0.001

Age categories

N

Percentage

N

Percentage

4-6 Years

140

5.52

135

5.28

0.062

7-9 Years

685

27.02

630

24.63

10-12 Years

943

37.20

942

36.83

13-15 Years

670

26.43

721

28.19

16-18 Years

97

3.83

130

5.08

Total

2535

100.00

2558

100.00

The simple bivariate Pearson r correlations between the dependent and independent variables are shown for both genders in Table 2. All coefficients were statistically significant (p < 0.001) and indicated a linear relationship between the variables. The relationships described were rather strong, not falling below ...