Abstract
The purpose of this study were to analyze the anthropometric data of feet of Korean women with aging, to categorize the women's foot shapes, and to compare the shoe size according to the foot shapes in order to provide the basic information for more comfortable shoes. Subjects of this study were 181 women over age 20. They were measured with the direct measurement method and the indirect measurement method. 26 items were measured from the right foot and 6 items were taken on foot outline. Factor analysis, cluster analysis, analysis of variance, post-hoc test, and cross tabs were peformed for statistical analysis of the data by SPSS program. There were significant differences in height items, breadth items, girth items, and angle items by subjects' age. The older subjects' feet were wide and thick with big deformity on toes. The arch height of the older ones was low. This implicates that the degree of deformity on toes, the foot ratio, the foot girth, the foot breath and the arch height as well as the foot length are needed to be considered in developing comfortable shoes. Nine foot construction factors were extracted by the factor analysis of anthropometric measurements; foot size factor, heel and instep factor, malleolus lateralis factor, malleolus medialis factor, foot shape factor, shape of toes factor, heel height factor, big toe height factor, and internal factor. On the basis of the cluster analysis, three different foot shapes were categorized. Type 1 was large and wide foot with little deformity on little toe. Type 2 was medium foot with deformation of big toe, and with the lowest arch height. Type 3 was small and narrow foot with the highest arch height. Distribution of shoe size according to the foot shape was analyzed. The ball of foot breath was of wide distribution than the ball of foot girth. This implicates that girth items and breath items of the foot should be enclosed for the same foot length in the shoe sizing system.