Abstract
Facial morphology, including age-related changes and asymmetry, is widely studied nowadays. This research is crucial for the evaluation of aesthetics, attractiveness, treatment of craniofacial malfor-mations and trauma, forensic identification, and more.
We followed studies of age-related changes of skulls or soft tissue thickness where asymmetry was usually related to the neonatal positioning, mastication laterality or developmental and invo-lution changes of these tissues. According to our hypothesis, facial asymmetry (1) does not depend on sex and (2) increases with age.The sample of our cross-sectional study consisted of 3D facial models of 300 Czech adults without craniofacial trauma or anomalies in the age range from 20 to 80 years.
Shape asym-metry analysis was based on 28 landmarks and assessed by geometric morphometry and multi-variate statistics.Our results showed that the manifestation of asymmetry was similar in each age category and in both sexes. In contrast to ideal symmetrical average face, the right upper face was located higher, nasal and mandibular region led to the left.
In frontal view, the upper face was rotated slightly clockwise and the lower face counterclockwise. After 60th year of age the manifestation of facial asymmetry began to differ significantly from young subjects.
Sex differences in facial asym-metry were significant before the age of 60.In conclusion, the general pattern of asymmetry is not fundamentally related to age, but after 60th year, asymmetry begins to vary significantly from younger subjects. These findings are consistent with our previous results of skull asymmetry assessments using computer tomography.