Exact Statistical Distribution and Correlation of Human Height and Weight: Analysis and Experimental Confirmation

Abstract

The statistical relationship between human height and weight is of especial importance to clinical medicine, epidemiology, and the biology of human development. Yet, after more than a century of anthropometric measurements and analyses, there has been no consensus on this relationship. The purpose of this article is to provide a definitive statistical distribution function from which all desired statistics (probabilities, moments, and correlation functions) can be determined. The statistical analysis reported in this article provides strong evidence that height and weight in a diverse population of healthy adults constitute correlated bivariate lognormal random variables. This conclusion is supported by a battery of independent tests comparing empirical values of 1) probability density patterns, 2) linear and higher order correlation coefficients, 3) statistical and hyperstatistics moments up to 6th order, and 4) distance correlation (dCor) values to corresponding theoretical quantities: 1) predicted by the lognormal distribution and 2) simulated by use of appropriate random number generators. Furthermore, calculation of the conditional expectation of weight, given height, yields a theoretical power law that specifies conditions under which body mass index (BMI) can be a valid proxy of obesity. The consistency of the empirical data from a large, diverse anthropometric survey partitioned by gender with the predictions of a correlated bivariate lognormal distribution was found to be so extensive and close as to suggest that this outcome is not coincidental or approximate, but may be a consequence of some underlying biophysical mechanism.