Phenotypic Correlates of Fitness among the Turkana in North-Western, Kenya

Abstract

The impact of various phenotypic features to fitness attributes in some human populations has been shown. Height, grip strength and even skin colour do in some human populations correlate positively with the individual's reproductive success. While most of the reported results have been from studies based on industrialised populations, the situation especially in various African countries isn't obvious.

By using several Kenya populations, this study reports that the universality of these phenotypic correlates on a population's fitness cannot be guaranteed. Among the Turkana, for example, height and skin colour do not in any way impact on the population's fitness. This we hypothesise could be due to the different factors that determine success based on the different environments, culture as well as subsistence mechanisms.