a spatula-jawed man with a big tongue...Find out the correlation between facial growth and tongue
Jul 03, 2025
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The tongue has been known to play an important role in the growth and development of the face and teeth. In particular, there have been many studies showing that low tongue positions associated with the habit of breathing through the mouth are associated with malocclusion, but studies exploring the relationship with various facial types have been lacking. In addition, there was a limitation that existing studies could only observe the cross section of the tongue using two-dimensional X-ray photographs.
The research team analyzed the shape of the facial bone and the position of the tongue in 185 adults through CBCT. As a result, the face, commonly referred to as 'spatula jaw', often has a forward chin, in which case the tongue tends to be below or large, and there was a complex association between the position and volume of the tongue and the facial shape.
Characteristically, it was confirmed that the position of the tongue tip was also low when the value indicating the propensity of the spatula was lowered, and on the contrary, when the value was increased, the position of the tongue tip was also increased. In addition, the higher the level of spatula chin tendency, the larger the tongue volume.
In addition, people with face shapes with long jaws tend to have relatively low tongue tips or back parts of the tongue, and longer face lengths are lower in the position of the tip and back of the tongue.
It was confirmed that the volume of the tongue was also related to the width of the teeth. When the tongue became bulky, the width between the upper molar, the lower molar, and the lower incisors increased, while the width between the upper incisors narrowed. It was also found that the width between the upper incisors narrows as the tip of the tongue is below, and the width between the upper and lower molar teeth tends to widen.
Professor Lee Yoo-sun explained, "As a result of studying from various angles that the posture of the tongue and the habit of breathing are closely related to the growth of the face and the dental arch through various measurements. In particular, in the case of growing season, treatment that corrects the wrong position of the tongue or breathing habits will have a good effect on facial growth."
Professor Kim Yun-ji said, "This study is meaningful in that it revealed vaguely thought concepts in three dimensions through 3D CBCT. We expect it to play an important role in revealing the correlation between facial growth patterns and tongue location and volume in the future."
한편, 이번 연구 'Associations of tongue and hyoid position, tongue volume, and pharyngeal airway dimensions with various dentoskeletal growth patterns'은 지난달 국제학술지 'PLOS One'에 게재됐다.
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This article was translated by Naver AI translator.
