New York African Burial Ground Skeletal Biology Final Report, Volume 1. Chapter 8. Childhood Health and Dental Development

Dental enamel hypoplasias are defects in crown development that appear as a
transverse groove or series of pits that are partially or entirely around the circumference of the tooth. Hypoplastic defects, while they manifest in the teeth, result from metabolic disturbances of malnutrition and disease elsewhere in the body. Enamel hypoplasias thus provide evidence of general stress that may have been brought about by many different kinds of stressors. Like other “general stress indicators” such as life expectancy, infant mortality, or growth retardation rates, frequencies of hypoplastic defects can be compared among different populations as a gross index of physical well-being and the adequacy of societal resources upon which the physical quality of life may depend. Of particular value, enamel hypoplasia develops in childhood and adolescence when both the deciduous and permanent teeth are formed.