60 Section GROWTH and DEVELOPMENT CHARACTER OF SECULAR CHANGES IN FUNCTIONAL INDICATORS AMONG SCHOOLCHILDREN OF POLOTSK (REPUBLIC OF BELARUS) Polina Natalya Institute of History, National Academy of Sciences of Belarus (NAS), Minsk, Belarus Dynamics of functional indices was followed for 8-, 13-, and 17-year-old schoolchildren of Polotsk. <...> Age changes of diastolic blood pressure in children were not so straightforward. <...> Changes in hand dynamometry (HD) in the period from 2002 to 2012 were also investigated among Polotsk schoolchildren. <...> A highly signifi cant (p<0.001) decline of HD among 8-year-old boys was revealed: for the right hand – 1.6 kg less, for the left hand – 1.7 kg less. <...> In groups of males of 13- and 17-year-old the increase was up to 0.7–1.4 kg, though the differences were not signifi cant. Among schoolgirls of all age groups HD values did not change. <...> The decrease of hand strength among schoolchildren was observed in various countries, so the tendency for the HD level to grow parallel to the improvement of the functional traits of the cardiovascular system among adolescent boys of Polotsk deserves attention and might be connected with stabilization of ecological and economic situation in Belarus. <...> Key words: schoolchildren, performance indicators, secular trend Contact information: Polina Natalya, e-mail: natpolina@mail.ru. <...> Scheffl er Christiane1 , Hermanussen Michaell,2 1Human Biology Department, Potsdam University, Potsdam, Germany 2Pediatrician, Gettorf, Germany Modern human life style has led to signifi cant decreases of everyday physical activity and bipedal locomotion. <...> It has previously been shown that skeletal robustness (relative elbow breadth) is associated with daily step counts. <...> The aim of the study was to investigate whether other skeletal measures, particularly pelvic breadth, also may have changed in recent decades. <...> Elbow breadth, pelvic breadth (bicristal), and thoracic depth and breadth, of up to 28,975 healthy females and 28,288 healthy males aged 3–18 years from crosssectional anthropological surveys performed between 1980 and 2012 by the Universities of Potsdam and Berlin, Germany, were re-analysed. <...> Since 1980 relative elbow breadth (Frame index) signifi cantly decreased in both sexes (<0.001). <...> The trend towards slighter built was even <...>