106 A BIOMETRIC STUDY OF BASAL METABOLISM IN MAN. 



6. There is a substantial correlation between stature and gaseous 

 exchange. The correlations for men are of the order r = 0.60, while 

 for women they are of the order r = 0.30. In terms of actual gas volume 

 these coefficients show that oxygen consumption increases about 1 c.c. 

 for each increase of 1 cm. in stature in the women, whereas in the men 

 the increase is between 2 and 3 c.c. Comparable, but somewhat lower 

 values are found for carbon-dioxide excretion. 



7. The correlations between both stature and body-weight on the 

 one hand and oxygen consumption on the other are higher than those 

 between these two physical characters and carbon-dioxide excretion. 

 Since the total volume of oxygen consumed is not excreted as carbon 

 dioxide this result should have been expected. 



8. Comparison of the correlations between body-weight and gase- 

 ous exchange and those between stature and gaseous exchange shows 

 that the correlation between weight and gaseous exchange is higher 

 than that between stature and gaseous exchange. Thus body-mass is a 

 more important factor than is stature in determining (in the statistical 

 but not necessarily in the causal sense) gaseous exchange. 



9. The correlations between body-weight and total heat-production 

 are high. Thus coefficients of the order r = 0.75 to r = 0.80 have been 

 found for male and female new-born infants, of the order r=0.80 in 

 men and r = 0.60 in women. In terms of actual heat productions these 

 correlations, taken in connection with the means and standard devia- 

 tions, show that in the new-born infants a difference of 100 grams in 

 body-weight implies a difference of about 3.4 calories in daily heat- 

 production. In the adults a difference of one kilogram in body-weight 

 is followed by an average difference of 8.2 calories in heat-production 

 in women and 15.8 calories in men. 



10. There is a significant positive correlation between stature 

 (body-length) and total heat-production in both new-born infants and 

 adults. The correlations are consistently lower than those for weight 

 and total heat-production. 



11. Since tall individuals are on the average heavy individuals, and 

 since heavy individuals are on the average tall individuals, it has been 

 necessary to inquire to what extent the correlation between total heat- 

 production and stature is merely the statistical resultant of the correla- 

 tions between weight and heat and stature and weight, and to inquire 

 to what extent the correlation between weight and heat-production is 

 merely the resultant of the correlation between stature and heat- 

 production and between weight and stature. In proceeding in this 

 way we have been treating the data in a purely objective manner, 

 basing our treatment on no physiological theory concerning the relative 

 importance of stature or weight in determining basal metabolism. Our 

 results show that both stature and body-weight have independent sig- 

 nificance in determining the basal metabolism of the normal individual. 



