The Root of Misaligned Jaws

By Sandra Kahn, Paul R. Ehrlich

The sudden rise in prevalence of crooked teeth is likely related to industrialized diets and environments, rather than genetics.

Biology Evolution Medicine Anatomy

This Article From Issue

March-April 2019

Volume 107, Number 2

Page 112

DOI: 10.1511/2019.107.2.112

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This is a story about a vast and serious epidemic afflicting the developed world increasingly over the past few centuries, one that has gone virtually unrecognized. The epidemic’s roots lie in cultural shifts in important daily actions we seldom think about; we just do them automatically. We don’t think about chewing, breathing, growing, or sleeping, or the position of our jaws when we’re not eating or talking.

Oral posture—the way we habitually hold our mouth, jaws, and tongue when eating, talking, or at rest—has received little attention from medical practitioners, but it plays an important role in lifelong health. Poor habits of oral posture, such as chewing with one’s mouth open or breathing through an open mouth (*left*) rather than through the nose (*right*), can chronically restrict the airway in the throat, raising the risk of sleep apnea and a host of related disorders.

**Images courtesy of the authors.**

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