7 ms·

As a tall Dutch man who has been dragged into this conversation a lot, it is interesting to note that only 150 years ago, the Dutch were the shortest nationalit

by Phemist 10y ago

As a tall Dutch man who has been dragged into this conversation a lot, it is interesting to note that only 150 years ago, the Dutch were the shortest nationality in Europe. To me this means that nutrition has a massive effect on growth. In fact, regular food in Dutch supermarkets is supposedly the most cost-effective fresh food on the planet, ie quality/freshness vs price. I wouldnt be surprised if the growth in relative length of the Dutch correlated with the increased centralization of commerce through the port of Rotterdam (and thus provide access to lots of fresh produce quickly, compared to countries "down the rivers".

randomname2 10y ago
Could this possibly be due to other environmental factors than nutrition? (i.e. epigenetics, location, lifestyle)
- Phemist 10y ago
  The absolute growth in average height? For sure. But a lot of these changes in lifestyle happened in steplock with other European countries (sweden, norway, germany) so they don't necessarily explain why we had such massive growths relative to other European countries. Epigenetics are interesting, offspring of survivors of the winter of 1944 (what we call "de hongerwinter") had a tendency towards obesity, more so than people who were born slightly before that winter. I'm not aware of any studies on height and epigenetics. Our country has always been prone to flooding, but if anything, such "evolutionary" pressures have gotten less as we developed more technology to deal with flood-prone areas.
  - lostlogin 10y ago
    There seems to be a link between obesity and a period of famine during gestation. Not sure about height though. http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2011/04/why-skinny-moms-sometimes-produce-fat-children http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2011/04/why-skinny-moms-somet...
    - Phemist 10y ago
      Yes, the study mentioned in the 2nd paragraph is the "hongerwinter" study I mentioned int he previous comment.
planck01 10y ago
I am Dutch and tall too. Way taller than my parents. However, I always suspected it has to do with things like growth hormone in meat instead of fresh food.
- Phemist 10y ago
  I agree, there probably are specific foodstuffs in our diet now (such as dairy & meat) that cause growth above other foodstuffs, but these have become more affordable across the board due to "early-access" availability in the distribution chain (with a major component of that being the port)
- spiderfarmer 10y ago
  Growth hormones have been banned in the Netherlands since 1961 and usage wasn't widespread beforehand.
- bitserf 10y ago
  I am of Dutch descent, but I have never set foot in the Netherlands. Somehow, though, I am much taller (6'1) than my dad and his father, who were both pretty short (5'2).
leg100 10y ago
Personally, I find the Dutch diet to be pretty unadventurous and poor. Sandwiches predominate, with not a lot of variety in cooking. This may well be irrelevant to the OP; nothing but cheese sandwiches and sour buttermilk may well be the perfect diet for growing tall. As for the Rotterdam argument, I suspect fresh food would have to be flown in rather than shipped, which takes weeks.
- donkeyd 10y ago
  > nothing but cheese sandwiches and sour buttermilk It's better than hamburgers an coke, or fish and chips and beer, I guess. Which are just as much b.s. stereotypical views of US and British diets as yours is of a Dutch diet.
- jimjimjim 10y ago
  The foodies will probably lynch me for heresy, but I think the best diet/health advice is to seek boring food.
  - TheSpiceIsLife 10y ago
    I just ate dessert, which consisted of the following: Finely chopped red and green cabbage mixed with Greek yogurt, sprinkled with mixed dried fruit, a few apricot halves from a can and some chopped canned pine apple (canned fruit because I'm slack). I wouldn't call it boring, but that has got to be bloody healthy, right?
- hellofunk 10y ago
  Yes, but they are the best sandwiches I've ever had anywhere. The Dutch treat every sandwich like a little work of art, I've had countless since visiting the Netherlands that made me wish other countries knew what they were doing! The strong emphasis on fresh fruits and vegetables (and fresh mint tea, which is as common as water in Holland) is also really nice compared to the greasy, messy, fatty foods of the U.S. and Germany.
  - gpvos 10y ago
misja111 10y ago
I've heard the explanation that the tallness of the Dutch is because they consume so many dairy products. It sounds quite plausible to me, because if you look at the other countries in the top of the list, many of them are countries which consume a lot of dairy products as well. It even could explain why the Maasai are so much taller than other Africans, because they drink a lot of cow milk too.
- radicalbyte 10y ago
  I doubt it. I come from the South West of England (known for enormous consumption of dairy products) and people aren't tall. I'm just under 6ft and was tall there, whereas I'm short here in The Netherlands. It's probably a combination of genetics, cycling everywhere and eating so many slices of brown bread and potatoes. Basic statistics also plays a part: when comparing arbitrary groups you'll often see smaller groups as outliers. Both high and low. Dutch population isn't huge (16m) so that is also a contributing factor..
  - misja111 10y ago
    Good point about the outlier bias for small countries. It could explain why Estonia, Latvia and Iceland are in the top 10.
  - SideburnsOfDoom 10y ago
    > often see smaller groups as outliers Is there a name for that phenomenon? I saw a similar thing in some data that we were looking at recently, and it took a while to work out that the reason why one group's number was consistently a bit smaller than another group's number was that we were simply taking the max of a smaller group. it's obvious in retrospect, but can catch you out if you're not expecting it. I'd like to have a name for it, a reference to send people to.
    - duggan 10y ago
      I think the terms you're looking for are local maxima and minima.
Eyght 10y ago
There was a study last year that pointed to Dutch women preferring tall men as the most probable cause of the rapid increase in height. [1] [1] http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2015/04/did-natural-selection-make-dutch-tallest-people-planet http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2015/04/did-natural-selection...
- spiderfarmer 10y ago
  The role of environmental factors is much larger, just about everyone I know here in NL is taller than their parents.
- skoczymroczny 10y ago
  Interesting. Do you know if there are any cultures in which women prefer shorter men?
  - tim333 10y ago
    I think women liking tall men is pretty much universal which would lead to them getting taller and taller though evolution. As they men aren't all extra tall there are presumably counter factors like tall people needing more food in famines or having back problems I'd imagine. I heard someone say the average Frenchman used to be taller but Napoleon put a lot of the tall ones in his army and then lost them in battle.
    - chrischen 10y ago
      Height has definitely transcended other physical traits like physical strength in terms of hunter-gatherer advantageous traits. Women still prefer many of these physical traits, but probably not as much as wealth, which is linked to intelligence, which comes by default with age. So you have to factor in what traits are conducive to wealth accumulation, and the easiest and biggest one is probably longevity. If you can be an older, wealthier male with his shit together, that's probably one of the bigger factors over height.
  - drcross 10y ago
    This is just speculation but I think most likely in a Jungle environment where being light on your feet helps during a hunt.
PostThisTooFast 10y ago
In an informal survey of online dating profiles, short-ass Asian chicks preferring way-taller-than-necessary-for-them men was about 90%.
KaiserPro 10y ago
As a someone born abroad to a dutch parent, I'm not convinced of the diet argument. I'm 6'3" and that has nothing to do with the boiled meats and sugar diet so prevalent in Nederlands. I suspect its down to breeding more than anything else. Although that doesn't explain such a massive change over less than 5 generations.
Phemist 10y ago
I'd also like to call attention to Belgian men finishing a respectable second place for men (although Belgian women don't feature in their respective top 10). I would argue this supports my Port of Rotterdam and cost-effectiveness of produce hypothesis, as Belgium would benefit similarly from its proximity to the port, even though Belgian diet is a lot less dairy-centric than the Dutch diet. There should also be measurable differences between Flanders and Wallonia, due to Wallonia being more distant in km, but less so between flemish and wallonians in Brussels, because of the "wallonian enclave" situation (even though the diets supposedly differ) If anyone feels like testing this hypothesis..

by Phemist 10y ago

randomname2 10y ago

Could this possibly be due to other environmental factors than nutrition? (i.e. epigenetics, location, lifestyle)

Phemist 10y ago
The absolute growth in average height? For sure. But a lot of these changes in lifestyle happened in steplock with other European countries (sweden, norway, germany) so they don't necessarily explain why we had such massive growths relative to other European countries. Epigenetics are interesting, offspring of survivors of the winter of 1944 (what we call "de hongerwinter") had a tendency towards obesity, more so than people who were born slightly before that winter. I'm not aware of any studies on height and epigenetics. Our country has always been prone to flooding, but if anything, such "evolutionary" pressures have gotten less as we developed more technology to deal with flood-prone areas.
- lostlogin 10y ago
  There seems to be a link between obesity and a period of famine during gestation. Not sure about height though. http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2011/04/why-skinny-moms-sometimes-produce-fat-children http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2011/04/why-skinny-moms-somet...
  - Phemist 10y ago
    Yes, the study mentioned in the 2nd paragraph is the "hongerwinter" study I mentioned int he previous comment.

planck01 10y ago

I am Dutch and tall too. Way taller than my parents. However, I always suspected it has to do with things like growth hormone in meat instead of fresh food.

Phemist 10y ago
I agree, there probably are specific foodstuffs in our diet now (such as dairy & meat) that cause growth above other foodstuffs, but these have become more affordable across the board due to "early-access" availability in the distribution chain (with a major component of that being the port)
spiderfarmer 10y ago
Growth hormones have been banned in the Netherlands since 1961 and usage wasn't widespread beforehand.
bitserf 10y ago
I am of Dutch descent, but I have never set foot in the Netherlands. Somehow, though, I am much taller (6'1) than my dad and his father, who were both pretty short (5'2).

leg100 10y ago

Personally, I find the Dutch diet to be pretty unadventurous and poor. Sandwiches predominate, with not a lot of variety in cooking. This may well be irrelevant to the OP; nothing but cheese sandwiches and sour buttermilk may well be the perfect diet for growing tall. As for the Rotterdam argument, I suspect fresh food would have to be flown in rather than shipped, which takes weeks.

donkeyd 10y ago
> nothing but cheese sandwiches and sour buttermilk It's better than hamburgers an coke, or fish and chips and beer, I guess. Which are just as much b.s. stereotypical views of US and British diets as yours is of a Dutch diet.
jimjimjim 10y ago
The foodies will probably lynch me for heresy, but I think the best diet/health advice is to seek boring food.
- TheSpiceIsLife 10y ago
  I just ate dessert, which consisted of the following: Finely chopped red and green cabbage mixed with Greek yogurt, sprinkled with mixed dried fruit, a few apricot halves from a can and some chopped canned pine apple (canned fruit because I'm slack). I wouldn't call it boring, but that has got to be bloody healthy, right?
hellofunk 10y ago
Yes, but they are the best sandwiches I've ever had anywhere. The Dutch treat every sandwich like a little work of art, I've had countless since visiting the Netherlands that made me wish other countries knew what they were doing! The strong emphasis on fresh fruits and vegetables (and fresh mint tea, which is as common as water in Holland) is also really nice compared to the greasy, messy, fatty foods of the U.S. and Germany.
- gpvos 10y ago

misja111 10y ago

I've heard the explanation that the tallness of the Dutch is because they consume so many dairy products. It sounds quite plausible to me, because if you look at the other countries in the top of the list, many of them are countries which consume a lot of dairy products as well. It even could explain why the Maasai are so much taller than other Africans, because they drink a lot of cow milk too.

radicalbyte 10y ago
I doubt it. I come from the South West of England (known for enormous consumption of dairy products) and people aren't tall. I'm just under 6ft and was tall there, whereas I'm short here in The Netherlands. It's probably a combination of genetics, cycling everywhere and eating so many slices of brown bread and potatoes. Basic statistics also plays a part: when comparing arbitrary groups you'll often see smaller groups as outliers. Both high and low. Dutch population isn't huge (16m) so that is also a contributing factor..
- misja111 10y ago
  Good point about the outlier bias for small countries. It could explain why Estonia, Latvia and Iceland are in the top 10.
- SideburnsOfDoom 10y ago
  > often see smaller groups as outliers Is there a name for that phenomenon? I saw a similar thing in some data that we were looking at recently, and it took a while to work out that the reason why one group's number was consistently a bit smaller than another group's number was that we were simply taking the max of a smaller group. it's obvious in retrospect, but can catch you out if you're not expecting it. I'd like to have a name for it, a reference to send people to.
  - duggan 10y ago
    I think the terms you're looking for are local maxima and minima.

Eyght 10y ago

There was a study last year that pointed to Dutch women preferring tall men as the most probable cause of the rapid increase in height. [1] [1] http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2015/04/did-natural-selection-make-dutch-tallest-people-planet http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2015/04/did-natural-selection...

spiderfarmer 10y ago
The role of environmental factors is much larger, just about everyone I know here in NL is taller than their parents.
skoczymroczny 10y ago
Interesting. Do you know if there are any cultures in which women prefer shorter men?
- tim333 10y ago
  I think women liking tall men is pretty much universal which would lead to them getting taller and taller though evolution. As they men aren't all extra tall there are presumably counter factors like tall people needing more food in famines or having back problems I'd imagine. I heard someone say the average Frenchman used to be taller but Napoleon put a lot of the tall ones in his army and then lost them in battle.
  - chrischen 10y ago
    Height has definitely transcended other physical traits like physical strength in terms of hunter-gatherer advantageous traits. Women still prefer many of these physical traits, but probably not as much as wealth, which is linked to intelligence, which comes by default with age. So you have to factor in what traits are conducive to wealth accumulation, and the easiest and biggest one is probably longevity. If you can be an older, wealthier male with his shit together, that's probably one of the bigger factors over height.
- drcross 10y ago
  This is just speculation but I think most likely in a Jungle environment where being light on your feet helps during a hunt.

PostThisTooFast 10y ago

In an informal survey of online dating profiles, short-ass Asian chicks preferring way-taller-than-necessary-for-them men was about 90%.

KaiserPro 10y ago

As a someone born abroad to a dutch parent, I'm not convinced of the diet argument. I'm 6'3" and that has nothing to do with the boiled meats and sugar diet so prevalent in Nederlands. I suspect its down to breeding more than anything else. Although that doesn't explain such a massive change over less than 5 generations.

Phemist 10y ago

I'd also like to call attention to Belgian men finishing a respectable second place for men (although Belgian women don't feature in their respective top 10). I would argue this supports my Port of Rotterdam and cost-effectiveness of produce hypothesis, as Belgium would benefit similarly from its proximity to the port, even though Belgian diet is a lot less dairy-centric than the Dutch diet. There should also be measurable differences between Flanders and Wallonia, due to Wallonia being more distant in km, but less so between flemish and wallonians in Brussels, because of the "wallonian enclave" situation (even though the diets supposedly differ) If anyone feels like testing this hypothesis..