title: Mexican body mass index values in the late-19th-century American West.
abstract: No research has been done on the body mass index values of the 19th-century Mexican population. This paper introduces a new data source of 19th-century Mexican male inmates in American prisons and finds that the majority of Mexican body mass was in the normal range (18.5-24.9). Few Mexicans were underweight or obese by modern standards. Body mass varied little (0-0.9 units) by occupations possibly because criminals probably came from the lower end of the socioeconomic distribution; however, it did vary with crimes for which inmates were incarcerated.
authors.affiliation: University of Texas, Permian Basin, 4901 East University, Odessa, TX 79762, USA. Carson_s@utpb.edu
authors.forename: Scott Alan
authors.initials: SA
authors.lastname: Carson
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D015992:Body Mass Index; D049672:History, 19th Century; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D017058:Mexican Americans / Q000266:history; D008800:Mexico / Q000208:ethnology; D008875:Middle Aged; D011330:Prisons; D014481:United States / Q000453:epidemiology