Estimating the Appearance of the Missing: Forensic Age Progression in the Search for Missing Persons

When children go missing for many years, police and missing persons agencies will commission the creation of age-progressed images designed to approximate the child’s current appearance. Traditionally, forensic artists have created such images by hand. Increasingly, computerized techniques are being implemented. This chapter outlines some of the major research investigating how effectively such images create recognizable likenesses of people. We begin with an overview of cases where such images are used, cover facts about craniofacial growth and development, and outline the major techniques for creating age progressions and their associated challenges. We conclude with future directions based on new, cutting-edge research.