Definition and Meaning of Demography

o Population wise, Demography connotes the totality of all human beings living at a

specific point of time within a territory demarcated by geographical, political or cultural

boundaries. Statistics emanating from demographical phenomenal relates to the study of

the measurement of characteristics related to populations and mainly concerned with the

growth of populations and the techniques of measurement of population growth.

o According to Kpedekpo (1982), demography is concerned with the description, analysis

and understanding of population phenomena. It seeks a mathematical and statistical

description of human population. Its scope embraces the examination of the size or number

of persons in the population, distribution – that is, arrangement of human population is

space at a given time, the structure – the distribution of the population according to age and

sex, and the population change over time – the growth or decline of the population .
 Definition and Meaning… (Cont.,)

o Demography, also connotes the scientific study of human population dynamics. These

major human population dynamics or population components include fertility, mortality

and population. Achilles Guillard first used the title on his book “Elements de Statisque

Humane ou Demographie Comparee”. Two Greek roots – demos and graphy are labeled as

people and branch of knowledge regarding a particular science in this case, uuman

populations. Guillard defined demography as the mathematical knowledge of population,

their general movements, and their physical, civil, intellect and moral state (Guillard, 1855(
 Contemporary Components of Demography
o Today demography encompasses the determinants and consequences of population change
and is concerned with virtually phenomenon that influences or can be influenced by:

 Population Size

 Population growth or decline

 Population processes – levels and trends in mortality, fertility and migration that are
determining population size and change

 Population characteristics – education, religion or ethnicity

 Population structure – how many by age and sex

o The study of demography is of great importance in economics, sociology, geography,

and socio-behavioural studies as a whole, for the optimization of scare resources in

relation to the human population at a specified time or period. The balance between

growths of population and resources has been a topic of great interest to economists

since the days of Malthus Thomas (1766-1834) who held the main trends to increase

faster than his means of subsistence.

Fertility, in demography, refers to the ability of females to produce

healthy offspring in abundance. Fecundity is the potential

reproductive capacity of a female. Some of the more common

demographic measures used in relation to fertility and/or fecundity

include:

– Crude birth rate – General fertility rate – Age-specific fertility rate –

Total fertility rate – Gross reproduction rate – Net reproduction rate

Mortality refers to the finite nature of humanity: people die. Mortality in

demography is interested in the number of deaths in a given time or place

or the proportion of deaths in relation to a population. Some of the more

common demographic measures of mortality include: – crude death rate:

the annual number of deaths per 1000 people – infant mortality rate: the

annual number of deaths of children less than 1 year old per thousand live

births – life expectancy: the number of years which an individual at a given

Crude Rates are obtained by relating the number of events of a specified

type occurring within the interval, usually one year, to the size of the

population within the which the event occur. For many purposes, the mid-

interval population is taken as the best estimate. The annual CDR, the CBR,

the crude marriage age, the crude economic activity rates are examples of

Crude Rates.

CDR = D/P * k, where D is the total number of deaths in the given years, P is the mean
 Cont.,…CBR and CDR

CBR = B/P * k, where B is the total number of live births in the given years, P is the mean

population and k is a constant, usually 1,000.

Exercise 1: In a given population, the number of persons captured in a census was 5,000,000

persons. The number of births and deaths recorded that year in the same population were

400,000 and 280,000 respectively. compute the CDR and CBR rates for the population

(Assumed that the census took place at midnight of 30 June/1 July, 2020).
 Sex and Age Specific Rates

o In order to have a good knowledge of mortality situation in a population, sex and age
specific rates are considered. Annual CDR for males (females is defined by:
o Number of male (female) deaths in a given year / mid-year male (female) population *
1000. similarly, age specific rates are defined.
o The annual age-specific death rate (per 1000) of age x is defined as Mx = Dx/Px * 1000
Where Dx is the number of deaths of persons aged x and Px is the mid-year population
aged x during a certain year.
 (Cont.,)…Specific Rates

o Specific rates are analogous to crude rates but are computed on the basis of events

according to particular sub-population.

o nMx = nEx/nPx * k, where nEx is the annual number of events at ages x to x+n, nPx is

the mean population of ages x to x+n and k = 1000

o The Total Fertility Rate (TFR) of a population is the average number of children that would be born
to a woman over her lifetime if:

 She were to experience the exact current age-specific fertility rates (ASFRs) through her life time,
and

 She were to survive from birth through the end of her reproductive life. It is obtained by summing
the single-year age-specific rates at a given time.
 Infant Mortality Rate (IMR)

o If Do is the number of deaths between birth and age one – the number of infants dying before
attaining the age one during a certain year and B is the total number of live births during the same
year, then

o IMR = Do/B *1000.

o The total number of fetal deaths experienced during the specified period of time ate still births, but
are excluded in the computation of IMR
 General Sex Ratio (GSR)

o The GSR is defined as the ratio of males to females in a given population. The GSR can be
computed from census enumeration of the total population or from sample survey:

o GSR = all males/all females * 100

o For example, if the total male and female population in Nigeria for the 2006 General Census were
44,858, 636 and 43, 990, 695 persons respectively, then the country GSR for the that period =

44,858, 636/43,990.695 * 100 = 101.9