A developmental approach to the interpretation of dermatoglyphic data from Papua New Guinea and the Faroe Islands

This study examines the influence of pattern intensity index (PII) on total ridge count (TRC) and the mean ridge count of whorls and ulnar loops. The date are principally finger print ridge counts and pattern types of 1005 Papua New Guineans (608 Waskia speakers from Karkar Island and 397 Yagaria speakers for Lufa sub District). In addition, in order to test whether some of the findings also apply to a dermatoglyphically very different population, data from a sample of 297 Faroe Islanders are analysed. The well known increase in TRC with PII is principally attributed to an increase in the mean ridge count of both whorls and ulnar loops, not as might be supposed to the increase in the proportion of whorls (overall the larger pattern type). The ratio of the larger ridge count to the smaller one provides a measure of whorl symmetry, which appears to increase with PII. The results are interpreted in terms of, and are in support of, the developmental hypothesis of dermatoglyphics reviewed by Mulvihill and Smith (1969).