1) Sally Smith conducted a study comparing the type and occurrence of footwear wear patterns and identifying characteristics between a controlled treadmill environment and an everyday outdoor environment over time. 2) The study found that more wear features were observed in the controlled treadmill environment, likely due to its less abrasive surface and lower overall percentage of wear compared to the outdoor environment. 3) Certain types of wear features, such as cuts and scratches, were more prevalent in the controlled environment, while features like foreign material and holes occurred more frequently in the outdoor environment. There was also a strong positive correlation between the number of features and the amount of time spent in both environments.

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A comparison of the type and occurrence of footwear wear
patterns and individual identifying characteristics between
a controlled and everyday environment over time
Name: Sally Smith
Supervisor: Adam S Long
BSc (Hons) Forensic Science
University of Derby
April 2016

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Acknowledgements
I would like to thank my supervisor Adam Long for his guidance throughout this project and Dr Ian
Turner for his help in preventing a statistic related crisis. I wish to thank Ceri Heldreich for her
assistance in booking the sports and exercise treadmill equipment and allowing me to make the
sports laboratory my home for six months! I would additionally like to thank my family and friends
for kindly proofreading this thesis and their enduring support while I completed approximately:
111 hours of walking;
Covering 179.81 kilometres;
Taking 392,188 steps;
Burning 6815.76 kilocalories and
Analysed 198 images.

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Abstract
Footwear evidence is often disregarded in favour of DNA or fingerprints. The purpose of this study
was to determine the influence of surfaces on footwear wear by investigating whether the
number and type of wear characteristics differed between laboratory controlled simulated walking
and an external natural setting over time. Canvas trainer shoes were chosen as the type of
footwear due to worldwide popularity. Data was collected for 0 to 720min (12 hours) of wear and
surface was found to be a determining factor. Further investigations have been suggested to
confirm these results. Seven types of feature: cuts/scratches, chunk outs, foreign material, holes,
stone holds, tears and other were selected for analysis after consultation with pertinent literature.
Statistical analysis confirmed more features were found in the control environment (p ≤ 0.05)
attributed to the less abrasive surface and lower overall percentage wear. Features in the
everyday environment were thought to be obliterated quicker due to the extensive wear of the
outsole. It was discovered that certain types of features were shown to be more prevalent in one
environment and a strong positive correlation was found between features and time. Findings
support that footwear evidence has uniqueness developed by many influencing factors and should
be held in higher regard in court.

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Conclusion
The findings described within this study show that environment has a significant effect on the
number and type of wear features which are acquired by footwear. More features were observed
in the control environment which was attributed to the lessened abrasive quality of the treadmill
surface and lower overall percentage wear. Features in the everyday environment were suggested
to be obliterated at an accelerated rate due to the more extensive wear of the outsole. A
prevalence for cuts/scratches and chunk outs were found in the control environment with foreign
material, holes and stone holds occurring more frequently in the everyday environment.
Furthermore, it has been shown that there is a strong positive correlation between the number of
features present and time in both environments and a strong positive correlation between the
acquisition rate of the left and right feet. Correlation between the type of feature and time
differed depending on environment. Cuts/scratches was the only significant correlation against
time in the control environment whereas significant correlations for cuts/scratches, holes, stone
holds and tears against time were observed in the everyday environment.
The research supports the notion that inked impressions are an out dated practice as suggested by
Needham & Sharp (2016). Further investigation is necessary into wear determined by number of
steps and surface type due to the present findings.
The final purpose of this study was to provide preliminary data for the Bayesian model proposed
by Skerett, Neumann & Mateos-Garcia (2011). The findings described here have shown that more
factors affect wear than shoe type, an assumption in this model. The findings are also in
agreement with redefining the broad categories of wear from toe, heel and combinations thereof
with each particular case. The data collated here could therefore provide information for the very
early stages of wear from 0 to 12 hours for one gait map (that of the researcher) to begin the wear
model.

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At present, the results show how wear patterns appear on the researcher’s footwear alone due to
the individuality of wear, supporting the concept that shoemarks are unique to an individual due
to gait, the structure of an individual’s foot (Krishna et al., 2015) and the variability in individual
identifying characteristics. This element of uniqueness developed by many influencing factors
show that footwear evidence is individual in nature and should be held in higher regard in court.