According to a number of research studies, including one conducted at Stanford University, men often exaggerate their height and strength. We ran across this after reading a couple of Lee Child’s novels, whose hero is six-foot-five Jack Reacher, that have been made into movies starring five-foot-seven (or five-foot-eight) Tom Cruise. Personally, we have a lot more issues with what Hollywood has done to the plots than the differences in sizes of the fictious hero and the movie one, because Tom Cruise has a lot of derring-do and his own attitude (plus a lot of acting skill) that comes through loud and clear.

Shorter men may not be as happy as their taller male friends or idols, but research studies in Hawaii among Japanese-American men and in San Diego among American veterans has shown that they live longer.