Chapter 4 | Population Growth and Decline

Rate of natural increase (RNI)

Rate at which a population grows as the result of the difference between the crude birth rate and the crude death rate

Doubling time (DT)

The number of years in which a population growing at a certain rate would double, assuming the RNI stays constant.

Urbanization

Urban growth and development

Overpopulation

The condition in which population growth outstrips the resources needed to support life

Neo-Malthusian

Describing the theory related to the idea that population growth is unsustainable and that the future population cannot be supported by Earth's resources

Demographic Transition Model

A model that represents shifts in the growth of the world’s populations, based on population trends related to birth rate and death rate

Epidemiological transition model (ETM)

A model that describes changes in fertility, mortality, life expectancy, and population age distribution, largely as the result of changes in causes of death

Antinatalist

Describing attitudes or policies that discourage childbearing as a means of limiting population growth

Pronatalist

Describing attitudes or policies that encourage childbearing as a means of spurring population growth

Land degradation

Long-term damage to the soil's ability to support life

Drivers of population change

Mortality, fertility, and migration

Birth rate trends

Decline in times of economic hardship, rise during prosperity, rates are higher for agriculturally based economies where children are used for labor, lower in industrialized economies where children can be seen as an economic burden

Roles of Women

As women enter the workforce in greater numbers, can better access family planning and education, wait to marry and have children, and balance home and work-life, fertility tends to drop

Consequences for caregivers

Evidence suggests that the chronic stress associated with caring for dependents contributes to poor health outcomes

DTM Stage 1

State of having no modern technology and population is restrained by environmental capacities and disease or predators

DTM Stage 2

Population growth, high birth rates and falling death rates as industrialization begins

DTM Stage 3

Birth rates fall alongside low death rates; population continues to rise

DTM Stage 4

Population still rising or has plateaued; low birth and death rates

DTM Stage 5

Rare stage that sees population decline