In an age when the adult populations of most industrialized nations have grown significantly taller, the average height of black women in the United States has been receding, beginning with those born in the late 1960s. The difference in stature between white women and black women has now stretched to three-quarters of an inch and appears to be increasing, according to newly released data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, conducted by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The main culprit appears to be diet.
The average height of a black woman born in the 1980s is just under 5 feet 4 inches; her mother, born in the 1960s, is more than half an inch taller. Even her grandmother, born in the 1940s, is a bit taller. The average white woman born in the 1980s is about half an inch taller than her mother.
“The only reasonable explanation we can come up with is diet and the obesity epidemic among (middle- and low-income) black women.”
Over the last three decades, the prevalence of obesity among white Americans has tripled, while among blacks it has increased fivefold. Almost 80 percent of black females are overweight or obese, compared with 62 percent of the total female population, according to the CDC.
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