Socioeconomic inequalities and their evolution in different historical contexts have been widely studied. However, some of their dimensions remain relatively unexplored, such as the role played by socioeconomic status in the trajectory of biological living standards, especially net nutritional status. The main objective of this article is to analyze whether the power of socioeconomic status (SES) to explain differences in the biological dimensions of human well-being (in this case, adult height, a reliable metric for health and nutritional status) has increased or diminished over time. Educational attainment and occupational category have been used as two different proxies for the SES of Spanish men and women born between 1940 and 1994, thus covering a historical period in Spain characterized by remarkable socioeconomic development and a marked increase in mean adult height. Our data is drawn from nine waves of the Spanish National Health Survey and the Spanish sample of two waves of the European Health Interview Survey (ENSE) for the period 1987 to 2017 (N = 73,699 citizens aged 23–47). A multivariate regression analysis has been conducted, showing that, as a whole, height differentials by educational attainment have diminished over time, whereas differences by occupational category of household heads have largely persisted. These results indicate the need for further qualification when describing the process of convergence in biological well-being indicators across social groups. For instance, the progressive enrollment of a greater proportion of the population into higher educational levels may lead us to underestimate the real differences between socioeconomic groups, while other proxies of SES still point to the persistence of such differences.

This article deals with the historical relationship between the number of siblings in a family or household and height, a proxy for biological living standards. Ideally, this relationship is better assessed when we have evidence on the exact number of siblings in a family from its constitution onwards. However, this generally requires applying family reconstitution techniques, which, unfortunately, is not always possible. In this latter case, scholars must generally settle for considering only particular benchmark years using population censuses, from which family and household structures are derived. These data are then linked to the height data for the young males of the family or household. Height data are generally obtained from military records. In this matching process, several decisions have to be taken, which, in turn, are determined by source availability and the number of available observations. Using data from late 19th-century Catalonia, we explore whether the methodology used in matching population censuses and military records as described above might affect the relationship between sibship size and biological living standards and, if so, to what extent. We conclude that, while contextual factors cannot be neglected, the methodological decisions made in the initial steps of research also play a role in assessing this relationship.

This chapter explores the beginning of the nutritional transition in relation to height in male populations of the Canary Islands. With military recruitment data for the cohorts of 1860 and 1915, it shows the insular advantage (height premium) compared to the average height of the Spanish populations of the Iberian Peninsula. The secular trend for height was positive. The increase in height of 2.4 cm during the expansive cycle of the island economy was comparable to that of the Spanish average. It also highlights the biological variability of the heights,probably due to the genetic composition of the island populations,and that the average urban height was greater than the average rural height. Finally,we find that height inequality increased in years when average height decreased,especially between 1866–1880 and 1900–1905. The Canarian height premium is analysed based on the insular environment,climate,economic cyclesand diet.

Developments in anthropometric history in the Iberian Peninsula have been remarkable in recent decades. In contrast, we barely know about the behavior of insular population groups and infants’ and adults’ growth during the nutritional transition in the Canary Islands. This paper analyzes the height, weight and body mass index of military recruits (conscripts) in a rural municipality from the eastern Canaries during the economic modernization process throughout the 20th century. The case study (municipality of San Bartolomé (SB) in Lanzarote, the island closest to the African continent) uses anthropometric data of military recruits from 1907–2001 (cohorts from 1886 to 1982). The final sample is composed of 1921 recruits’ records that were measured and weighed at the ages of 19–21 years old when adolescent growth had finished. The long-term anthropometric study is carried out using two approaches: a malnutrition and growth retardation approach and an inequality perspective. In the first one, we use the methodology recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO) that is based on z-scores. In the second one, we implement several inequality dimensions such as the coefficient of variation (CV), percentiles and an analysis for height and BMI evolution by five socioeconomic categories. The data suggest that improvements in biological well-being were due to advances in nutrition since the 1960s. They show that infant nutrition is sensitively associated with economic growth and demographic and epidemiological changes.

Hay al menos tres planos desde los que el nexo metodológico investigación-docencia puede contemplarse como factor estratégico en el proceso de aprendizaje universitario: 1) el de la productividad y competitividad científico-académica a nivel institucional; 2) el de la capacitación individual de cara a la integración en mercados laborales crecientemente competitivos y 3) el de la mejora de la eficiencia en el planteamiento de proyectos y gestión de recursos en los sectores público y privado. En los tres planos resulta evidente la contribución potencial de una docencia interactiva y experimental que ceda protagonismo a los estudiantes en la consecución de competencias. El objetivo de este trabajo es presentar y discutir dos experiencias inspiradas en estas metodologías que se desarrollan en asignaturas de grados de Ciencias Sociales en las Universidades de Jaén y Murcia. En torno a dichas experiencias se comentan algunos recursos de aprendizaje aplicados en distintas fases del curso y con distintas finalidades: fundamentos de diagnóstico a partir de la resolución de problemas de investigación, asimilación práctica de conceptos, técnicas de generación y de recopilación de información, y elaboración de soportes mediáticos para la presentación y difusión de resultados de investigación. Finalmente se presentan y discuten, desde el punto de vista docente, algunos resultados de aprendizaje obtenidos, las principales dificultades detectadas en la aplicación de la metodología y los avances obtenidos en las competencias establecidas originalmente. El objetivo de este trabajo es presentar y discutir dos experiencias inspiradas en estas metodologías que se desarrollan en asignaturas de grados de Ciencias Sociales en las Universidades de Jaén y Murcia. En torno a dichas experiencias se comentan algunos recursos de aprendizaje aplicados en distintas fases del curso y con distintas finalidades: fundamentos de diagnóstico a partir de la resolución de problemas de investigación, asimilación práctica de conceptos, técnicas de generación y de recopilación de información, y elaboración de soportes mediáticos para la presentación y difusión de resultados de investigación. Se comentan asimismo los principales condicionantes a los que se hace frente en el desarrollo de los proyectos. Finalmente se presentan y discuten algunos resultados de aprendizaje obtenidos, las dificultades detectadas en la aplicación de la metodología y los avances obtenidos en las competencias establecidas originalmente.