Unit 2: Population and Migration Patterns and Processes

Comprehensive vocabulary flashcards covering key terms and concepts for AP Human Geography Unit 2: Population and Migration Patterns and Processes.

Age-Sex Distribution

A model used in population geography that describes the ages and numbers of males and females within a given population; also called a population pyramid.

Agricultural Density

The number of farmers per unit area of farmland.

Arithmetic Density

The number of people living in a given unit area.

Baby Boom

A cohort of individuals born in the United States between 1946 and 1964, just after World War II in a time of relative peace and prosperity, which allowed for better education and job opportunities, encouraging high rates of both marriage and fertility.

Baby Bust

Period during the 1960s and 1970s when fertility rates in the United States dropped considerably as large numbers of women from the baby boom generation sought higher levels of education and more competitive jobs, causing them to marry later in life.

Carrying Capacity

The largest number of people that the environment of a particular area can sustainably support.

Chain Migration

The migration event in which individuals follow the migratory path of preceding friends or family members to an existing community.

Child Mortality Rate

Number of deaths per thousand children within the first five years of life.

Cohort

A population group unified by a specific common characteristic, such as age, and subsequently treated as a statistical unit.

Cotton Belt

The term by which the American South used to be known because cotton historically dominated the region's agricultural economy; now known as the New South or Sun Belt due to migration from older northern industrial cities for a better climate and new job opportunities.

Crude Birth Rate

The number of live births per year per thousand people.

Crude Death Rate

The number of deaths per year per thousand people.

Demographic Accounting Equation

An equation that summarizes the amount of growth or decline in a population within a country during a particular time period, taking into account both natural increase and net migration.

Demographic Transition Model

A sequence of demographic changes in which a country moves from high birth and death rates to low birth and death rates through time.

Demography

The study of human populations, including their temporal and spatial dynamics.

Dependency Ratio

The ratio of the number of people who are either too old or too young to provide for themselves to the number of people who must support them through their own labor, usually expressed in the form $n:100$, where $n$ equals the number of dependents.

Doubling Time

Time period required for a population experiencing exponential growth to double in size completely.

Emigration

The process of moving out of a particular country, usually the individual person's country of origin.

Epidemiological Transition

Sudden population growth as a result of improved food security and health care, followed by a plateau in growth because of subsequent declines in fertility rates.

Exponential Growth

Growth that occurs when a fixed percentage of new people is added to a population each year; compound because the fixed growth rate applies to an ever-increasing population.

Forced Migration

The migration event in which individuals are forced to leave a country against their will.

Generation X

A term coined by artist and author Douglas Coupland to describe people born in the United States between the years 1965 and 1980 who will have to support the baby boom cohort as they retire.

Geodemography

Another term for population geography; the study of spatial variations in population distribution, composition, growth, and movement.

Immigration

The process of individuals moving into a new country with the intention of remaining there.

Infant Mortality Rate

The percentage of children who die before their first birthday within a particular area or country.

Internal Migration

The permanent or semipermanent movement of individuals within a particular country.

Intervening Obstacles

Any forces or factors that may limit human migration.

Involuntary Migration

Another term for forced migration; the migration event in which individuals are forced to leave a country against their will.

Life Expectancy

The average age individuals are expected to live, which varies across space, between genders, and even between races.

Thomas Malthus

Author of Essay on the Principle of Population (1798) who claimed that population grows at an exponential rate while food production increases arithmetically, causing population growth to eventually outpace food production.

Maternal Mortality Rate

Number of deaths per thousand of women giving birth.

Migration

A long-term move of a person from one political jurisdiction to another.

Natural Increase Rate

The difference between the number of births and number of deaths within a particular country.

Neo-Malthusian

Advocacy of population-control programs to ensure enough resources for current and future populations.

Overpopulation

A value judgment based on the notion that the resources of a particular area are not great enough to support that area's current population.

Physiologic Density

A ratio of human population to the area of cropland, used in less-developed countries dominated by subsistence agriculture.

Population Density

A measurement of the number of persons per unit of land area.

Population Geography

A division of human geography concerned with spatial variations in distribution, composition, growth, and movements of population.

Population Pyramid

A model used in population geography to show the age and sex distribution of a particular population.

Pull Factors

Attractions that draw migrants to a certain place, such as a pleasant climate and employment or educational opportunities.

Push Factors

Incentives for potential migrants to leave a place, such as a harsh climate, economic recession, or political turmoil.

Refugees

People who leave their home because they are forced out, but not because they are being officially relocated or enslaved.

Rust Belt

The northern industrial states of the United States (including Ohio, Michigan, and Pennsylvania) that lost much of their economic base during the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s to cheaper labor markets and economically attractive regions, leaving machinery to rust.

Sun Belt

A United States region, mostly comprising southeastern and southwestern states, which has grown most dramatically since World War II.

Total Fertility Rate

The average number of children born to a woman during her childbearing years.

Voluntary Migration

Movement of an individual who consciously and voluntarily decides to locate to a new area—the opposite of forced migration.

Zero Population Growth

A proposal to end population growth through a variety of official and nongovernmental family-planning programs.