Dental wear scoring technique

Abstract

Abstract An ordinal dental attrition scoring technique for molar teeth involving a quadrant system is applied to three Amerind skeletal samples. Molar teeth are visually divided into four sections and each section scored on a 1–10 scale. The score for the whole tooth is the sum of the quadrant scores and ranges from 4–40. Scores are based on the amount of enamel in each quarter of the tooth. The method's reliability is demonstrated by a paired comparison type of ANOVA, for both intra‐ and inter‐observer repeated measurements. Because the method is reliable, easy to use, and produces data with lower variances than a 1–8 system (such as Molnar's ['71]), it is recommended for use in the principal axis technique for the analysis of wear data presented in the accompanying paper.