Chapter 2 Key Issue #1 – Where is the World’s Population Distributed?

Introduction –

  1. The scientific study of population characteristics is ______.
  1. Why is the study of population critically important?
  2. What is the earth’s current population (approximately)?
  1. When does overpopulation occur?
  1. Is the world overpopulated?

Key Issue #1

  1. What two basic properties are used to examine the world’s population distribution?
  1. How is the number of people in an area usually determined?

Use Contemporary Geographic Tools to answer questions 8-10

  1. When are census reports taken?
  1. For what two reasons is the census controversial?
  1. Why do some people fear giving census information to the government?
  1. According to Figure 2-2 Population cartogram, what are the 11 most populated countries in the world?
  1. What proportion of the world’s population is clustered in Asia?

Population Concentrations

  1. Name the four major population clusters in the world (in order of size from biggest to smallest)?
  1. What geographic characteristics do all of these clusters share?
  1. What percent of the world’s population lives in East Asia?
  1. Name the countries in the region called “East Asia”.
  2. What is the most populous country in the world?
  1. Where do over half of China’s people live? How is this different from Korea and Japan?
  1. What percent of the world’s population live in South Asia?
  1. Name all the countries included in the region called “South Asia”.
  1. Where is South Asia’s largest concentration of people found? Why?
  1. What do most of the people in South Asia have in common with the Chinese?
  1. What are the smallest and largest (in area) countries in the European population cluster?
  1. How does Europe’s population distribution different from the three Asian clusters?
  1. What country contains the largest proportion of Southeast Asia’s population?
  1. Name 5 other countries in Southeast Asia (not listed in book).
  1. What does Southeast Asia have in common with the other two Asian population clusters?
  1. Where is the largest population cluster in the western Hemisphere?
  1. Where is the largest population cluster in Africa?

Sparsely Populated Regions

  1. In what kinds of regions do relatively few people live?
  1. The portion of the earth’s surface which is occupied by permanent human settlement is called ______.
  2. In what ways do people survive on the 20% of the earth’s surface that is considered too dry?
  1. Why are lands that receive too much precipitation inhospitable?
  1. What is land that is permanently frozen called?
  1. Despite many mountain regions being too steep and snow covered to live on, some high altitude plateaus and mountain regions are more densely populated. What are some examples of these exceptions (not in book)?
  1. According to figure 2-4, approximately ______of the world’s population live on only ______of the earth’s surface.

Population Density

  1. What are the 3 ways that the number of people occupying an area of land can be computed?
  1. What does arithmetic density measure, and how is it computed?
  1. Arithmetic density allows geographers to answer what geographic question?
  1. What does physiological density measure, and why is it a more meaningful measurement than arithmetic density?
  1. Explain the difference between the physiological and arithmetic density in Egypt.
  1. What percentage of Egypt’s land is actually arable land?
  1. What does agricultural density measure, and for what differences does it account?
  1. What kinds of countries have lower agricultural densities? Why?
  1. Should a country want a high or low agricultural density?
  1. How do the densities of Egypt and the Netherlands compare?
  1. According to Table 2-1 on p. 48 which country has the most problematic density statistics?
  1. According to Figure 2-5, where are the highest arithmetic densities in the world? The lowest?
  1. In what regions are the highest physiological densities in the world found? The lowest?
  1. Name 3 countries that have high physiological and high agricultural densities.