This chapter reviews methods for the construction of human growth references. Specifically, the chapter aims to address the following questions:

1. What are the purposes and uses of growth references?

2. How are growth references presented?

3. What design features are needed for studies to construct growth references?

4. What analytical methods are used to construct growth references?

5. What are some recent examples of how growth references were constructed?

6. What are future challenges for the construction of growth references?

Purposes and uses of growth references

Rationale for references

How do we know if our children are healthy, well nourished and developing? Parents and others who interact closely with children have many and diverse ways of making such assessments. One common way is assessing how children are growing. Assessing the growth of children is important for judging their overall progress at both population and individual levels. Growth information is useful because it relates to multiple dimensions of health and development, underlying socio-economic and environmental determinants of poor health and development, and basic causes of poor socio-economic conditions and poor environments (Frongillo and Hanson, 1995). Growth measurements are relatively simple and inexpensive to make, although important training is required to obtain good-quality measurements. Furthermore, growth information provides a universal language for understanding and comparing child well-being. In assessing the growth of a child (or a group of children), interest is not so much the size of the child at any one time, but how the child's size is changing over time.