102 Chapter 5 RESULTS Fifty-one volunteers signed up for this study; 23 were female and 28 were male (45.1% : 54.9%). The average age was 42.6 ± 14.8 years (range 20-71 years). The average age of female and male participants did not differ significantly (Mann-Whitney U test p>0.05). The palatal surface area and anthropometric measurements The palatal surface area as well as the anthropometric measurements of the head and face are reported for the total study sample as well as the female and male participants separately (Table 2). The median palatal surface area for the total study sample was 2120.6 ± 2232.0-1976.3 mm2. The ICC for the palatal surface area measurements and the anthropometric measurements varied between 0.85 and 0.99, which was in the good or excellent range. Almost all anthropometric measurements showed significant differences between females and males (Mann-Whitney U test p<0.05), where male participants showed higher values than females (Table 2). No sex-related differences were observed for the width of the mouth and palatal width. There was also no significant difference for the palatal surface area between females and males (Mann-Whitney U test p>0.05). Relation between the palatal surface area and anthropometric measurements of the head and face For the total study sample, a significant correlation was found between the palatal surface area and the length of the head, the width of the head, the face height, the nose height, the upper face height, the upper lip height, the mandibular length and the palatal width (Table 3). The correlation coefficients for these correlations ranged between 0.29 and 0.37, which indicate poor to fair correlations. These positive correlations indicate that larger dimensions of the head and face are associated with a larger palatal surface area. When the volunteers were stratified based on sex, the female palatal surface area correlated positively with the mandibular length (0.46) and the palatal width (0.56) (Table 3). These correlations could be considered as fair.
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