LAE Faculty Forum: The Composite Method

LAE's October Faculty Forum will feature The Composite Method: A Novel, Continuum-Based Approach to Estimating Age from the Male Pubic Symphysis with Particular Relevance to Mature Adults, presented by Dr. Janamarie Truesdell, Assistant Professorof Forensic Investigation.

This forum examines completing the long-awaited companion paper to “The Composite Method: A Novel, Continuum-Based Approach to Estimating Age from the Female Pubic Symphysis with Particular Relevance to Mature Adults.” While the original doctoral research (2016) outlined five planned publications and introduced the female component of the Composite Method, the corresponding male methodology was never fully developed for publication. Males and females do not age identically at the pubic symphysis (males require five density adjustment categories where females need only three, for example); however, due to time and length constraints, focusing on one group over the other became a necessity and so the female template was prioritized due to the more urgent need for accurate female estimation techniques within the forensic literature. As a result, attention to the male template (images, schematic drawings, description tables, etc.) lapsed and it has yet to be revisited.