To say that body proportions do not effect optimum bar width seems silly to me. Just look at the builds that come on women bikes, or the fact that some bikes come spec’ed with narrower bars on smaller sized bikes. Of course this is only one of many factors, the most important of all is simply personal preference.

This idea that bikes’ geo is designed around a certain bar width and that changing the bar width will screw up the geometry is nonsense. Ever see a bike manufacturer specify what bar widths are appropriate? They will often specify what fork lengths and tire sizes the bike was designed around, yet I have never seen one specify a target bar width.