ABSTRACT
The most often noticed racial differences are skin color, facial features, hair type, and body proportions. This chapter examines many of these differences, plus some less obvious surface and anatomic characteristics. The source of skin color variability is pigment, which is produced by the melanocytes in the epidermal layer of the skin. Other areas of the skin affected by hormones and often differing by race are the nipples, areola, scrotum, and labia majora. Leukoedema, a pigment condition that varies by race, is a grayish-white, benign lesion that occurs on the oral buccal mucosa. Apocrine and eccrine sweat glands vary in different groups, but sebaceous glands do not. Ear wax (cerumen) is produced by the apocrine glands in the external ear canal. The racial differences in height are partially caused by factors associated with socioeconomic differences. Social mobility also contributes to weight gains and losses. Pulmonary function, determined by vital capacity and forced expiratory volume, differs by race.
