Reply #45: A lot of it has to do with shoe wearing during childhood too.

[Xithras]

Few people realize it today, but the modern human foot is not shaped naturally. Left to its own devices (i.e., if never shod with a shoe), all of our feet would be much wider, with our toes spread apart when we walk. Instead, most western societies shove their kids feet into shoes when they're just babies. These shoes squeeze our feet from the sides, cram our toes together, and after only a few years completely redirect the growth in our feet.

The shape of your foot, therefore, is directly related to the amount of time you spend wearing shoes as a kid. I grew up poor and in the country, in an environment where shoes were discouraged (shoes were for school, so my mom encouraged us to take them off when we got home from class). I have wide feet. My kids, who haven't been more than a day without shoes since their first birthday, have narrow feet.

Generally speaking, reservations are poor places that tend to have a lot of barefoot kids running around. There's nothing wrong with that...in fact, I kind of miss running around barefoot in the dirt...but it can skew the statistics a bit. The wider feet may well simply be a result of growing up in such a poor place. They didn't wear shoes much as a kid, which lead to their feet developing a wider, more natural stance, which now requires a wider shoe in adulthood.