Anthropometric analysis of 3D ear scans of Koreans and Caucasians for ear product design

Abstract

The present study measured 25 dimensions of the ear including the concha and ear canal for ergonomic design of ear products and compared with existing ear measurement studies. Scanning and casting methods were employed to produce 3D ear images for 230 Koreans and 96 Caucasians and measurements of the ear dimensions were obtained by identifying 21 landmarks on individual ear scan image. The Korean ear measurements were found significantly larger (mean difference $\overline{d}$ = 0.4–3.7 mm) and more varied (ratio of SDs =1.01–1.55) than those of Caucasians in most of ear dimensions. The average ear length and ear breadth of male were significantly longer ($\overline{d}$ = 1.3–7.0 mm) and wider ($\overline{d}$ = 0.8–3.0 mm) than those of female. Use of gender- and ethnicity-composite ear data is recommended in product design due to the much larger intra-population variations (7.5–22.2 mm) than the corresponding inter-population variations.

Practitioner Summary: The 3D ear measurements of Koreans and Caucasians were collected and compared with those of different ethnic populations. The distinct ear features of the populations identified in this study are applicable to ergonomic design of ear products with better fit and comfort.

Abbreviations: CCW: cavum concha width; CV: coefficient of variation; EB: ear breadth; EL: ear length; SD: standard deviation; SE: sampling error; 3D: 3 dimensional

Keywords:

• Ear measurement
• 3D anthropometric analysis
• Korean ear
• Caucasian ear
• ear product design

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Acknowledgments

The authors appreciate the assistance of Sungho Kim, Teukgyu Choi, Jawon Lee, and Sujin Mun in 3D ear scanning.

Additional information

Funding

This research was jointly supported by Samsung Electronics, the National Research Foundation (NRF) of Korea funded by the Ministry of Science, ICT, and Future Planning (MSIP) (NRF-2017M3C1B6070526; NRF- 2018R1C1B5047805; NRF-2018R1A2A2A05023299), the Ministry of Trade, Industry, and Energy (No. 10063384; R0004840, 2017), and the Biomedical Research Institute Fund, Chonbuk National University Hospital.