Kathy writes: << Go to any mall in the US on a Sunday afternoon in a city where there are lots of relatively recent immigrants from parts of the world where environmental conditions are difficult and you can see the stair-step effect known as 'positive secular trend' -- here is grandma, born and raised in Guatemala (for example), at 4'10" tall; next is mother, born in Guatemala and brought to the US in her early teens, at 5'2" tall, and here is daughter, born and raised in the US, and already 5'6" at age 12 years. You see this all the time. Grandma was stunted, mother was somewhat stunted, daughter may still be a little stunted -- perhaps she'll end up 5'7" when her genetic potential was for 5'8". The next generation will probably max out the genetic potential, at last. >> Thank you for that interesting mention of this phenomenon, Kathy. Im sure you are right about the impact of better food and conditions. Do you have any experience with the immigrant tendency to modernize to artifical feeding when families enter the US, and begin to birth here, and whether these families will then attribute some of the increase in height and health to the 'wonders' of formula ? Is this any factor in the common decision to not breastfeed US born family members? Judy Le Van Fram, Brooklyn, NY *********************************************** The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(TM) mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html