Relationship of Heath and Carter's Second Component to Lean Body Mass and Height in College Women

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to compare Heath and Carter's anthropometric approach with the multiple regression technique for the prediction of lean body mass (LBM). Lean body mass was estimated from whole-body ⁴⁰K spectrometry and body density in college-age women. Heath and Carter's second component correlates .40 with LBM (density)/height and .24 with LBM (⁴⁰K)/height. The correlations are quite low and indicate that LBM per unit of height is not closely related to the second component. When lean body mass and height were used together in multiple regression analysis as separate predictors instead of a ratio, 48% of the variation was accounted for in the second component. A test of validity of the measures used to calculate Heath and Carter's second component was evaluated through the use of multiple regression analysis, incorporating height and anthropometric measures as independent variables and LBM from density and ⁴⁰K as dependent variables. The muscle circumferences but not skeletal widths in the Heath and Carter method were found to be valid predictors of LBM through regression analysis. LBM is predicted with a standard error of estimate of 2.2 kg using the anthropometric variables of Heath and Carter's second component. This error is comparable to the results of other anthropometric predictions of LBM in college-age women.