INDICES OF PHYSIOLOGICAL MATURITY: DERIVATION AND INTERRELATIONSHIPS1

Abstract

One of the goals of the Guidance Study has been to determine the relative contributions of the various bio-social factors associated with normal or deviating personality development. One such factor is physiological maturity, but before its relationship to personality could be studied, a method of assessing progress along the hypothetical maturational continuum had to be evolved. This paper concerns the derivation and interrelationships of which could be used to this end. In this study both external and indirect signs of an individual's progress toward maturity were considered. The search for indicators of rests on the belief that maturity is largely determined by endocrine factors evidenced in various discernible phenomena. With this in mind, many workers in the field have used growth indices to classify subjects as early, average, or late maturers. Usually one such measure, e.g., age at menarche, is utilized, perhaps with others then related to it. The scores of individuals on many variables must be studied, however, before it is possible to estimate the relative validity of any one variable. One of the objectives of the present study, therefore, was to determine the degree of generality in adolescent physical by means of a factorial analysis of the intercorrelations among various measures of maturation. A second objective was to use the general factor, if one should be found in such an analysis, as a criterion from which the relative efficiencies of the single measures of maturation could be evaluated. Our final goal was to assign each young person a Maturity Score which would (a) be based on the best single measure or combination of measures of the hypothetical factor, and (b) fall along a continuous rather than dichotomous dimension. The development of the separate measures or of maturation is described in Section I. The factorial analysis and the derivation of maturity 1 This study was carried out under the direction of Dr. Jean Walker Macfarlane of the Guidance Study at the Institute of Child Welfare. Special acknowledgment is due to Gene Rolfe La Forge, Marjorie P. Honzik, and Nancy Bayley for their suggestions and criticisms. The charts were drawn by Katherine Eardley. The clerical work and statistical analyses were made available by a grant-in-aid from the U.S. Public Health Service. The data collection was made possible by financial assistance from the Laura Spellman Rockefeller Fund, the General Education Board, the Rockefeller Foundation, and the University of California. * Deceased.