Effectiveness of Lip Print and Fingerprint Patterns for Gender Determination

The most trustworthy and recognized form of individual identification evidence in a court of law to date is without a doubt fingerprint evidence. Although cheiloscopy is also used to identify gender, unlike fingerprinting, there is still disagreement among researchers as to whether or not it is a reliable method. This chapter aims to determine sex of an individual from (1) lip print patterns, (2) fingerprint patterns, and (3) comparison of the two methods in sex determination.

Lip prints and left thumb finger prints were obtained from 89 study participants (43 males and 46 females). The obtained lip prints and fingerprint patterns were analyzed and statistically evaluated.

Lip print analysis outperformed fingerprints in terms of specificity (69.6%), positive predictive value (68.9%), and negative predictive value (72.7%) for gender identification.

Lip print patterns proved to be a simple, reliable, and valuable tool for sex determination, boosting forensic odontologists' role in criminal investigations.