Polar Dwellers Have Bigger Eyes, Brains

[n2doc]

By Mark Brown, Wired UK

Humans who live further from the equator have rapidly evolved bigger eyes and larger brains to better process the low light levels at those lofty latitudes.

Anthropologists at Oxford University collected 55 skulls, dating from the 1800s, that represented 12 different populations from around the globe. The researchers measured the eye socket and brain volumes and plotted them against the latitude of each individual’s country of origin.

The team, lead by the Institute of Cognitive and Evolutionary Anthropology’s Eiluned Pearce, found a significant positive correlation between the size of brain and the latitude of the country. People from the northern-European countries of Scandinavia had the biggest brains, while Micronesians, from just north of the equator, had the smallest.

The larger brains don’t necessarily relate to intelligence — bigger vision areas in the brain are required to help cope with the low light conditions caused by cloudy skies and long winters in northern territories. The study also notes that actual visual sharpness, measured under natural daylight conditions, is constant all around the globe, which further suggests that the visual processing system has adapted to ambient light conditions as humans colonized the Earth.

more
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2011/07/northerners-bigger-eyes-brains/

[leveymg]

1. This sounds like German eugenics from the 1930s. So what? Nordics are maladapted to the tropics,

Nyet?

[sharp_stick]

2. Before smearing the research

as Nazi eugenics perhaps even the quickest perusal of the thing would be helpful. The larger brain areas would be related to sight.

[bananas]

5. Is 55 skulls a statistically significant sample? nt

[Jim__]

7. According to the original article, p < .001

From the original article:

A significant positive relationship was found between absolute latitude and orbital volume (figure 1a: t10 = 6.686, p < 0.001, r2 = 0.817), controlling for phylogeny (see electronic supplementary material, figure S1; for all equations, see electronic supplementary material).

[angstlessk]

3. Now days large eyes indicate near sightedness...

wonder what the connection is?

[bananas]

4. Polish People Have Bigger Eyes, Brains

That's what they're really saying, isn't it?

[Odin2005]

6. That's simply because cold climate animals tend to larger sizes.

bigger body means bigger brain, it does not imply a difference in intelligence.