Chapter 15 Practice Quiz

Demography is the study of the size and composition of a society’s population

True

To calculate a crude birth rate, divide the number of live births in a year into the total population and multiply the result by 1,000

True

The crude birth rate in North America is lower than that for Asia

True

The crude death rate is the most widely used measure of a society’s population decline

False

The infant mortality rate for African Americans is more than twice as high as it is for white people

True

The average life expectancy for U.S. children born today is about sixty years

False

People’s movement out of a territory is called immigration

False

The forced transport of 10 million slaves from Africa to the Americas is an example of involuntary migration

True

Most people migrate due to a combination of "push-pull" factors

True

An annual growth rate of about 2% will cause a society’s population to double in about thirty-five years

True

In many low-income nations, parents value sons more than daughters, which explains why the age-sex ratio in these nations may be higher than 100

True

Thomas Robert Malthus expected population to increase according to an arithmetic progression

False

Environmental racism is a pattern by which environmental hazards are greatest for the poor, especially poor minorities

True

For decades, China has regulated fertility with a "one-child" policy

True

A metropolis is a large city that socially and economically dominates an urban area

True

Durkheim’s concept of mechanical solidarity parallels Tönnie’s concept of Gemeinschaft

True

George Simmel claimed that urbanites are so interested in each other’s lives that there is little privacy in cities

False

Because our planet is mostly covered with oceans, there is no shortage of fresh water

False

At the present rate of loss, almost all of the rain forests will be gone by the end of this century

True

In general, the way of life of people living in low-income nations causes much more harm to the environment than the way of life of people living in high-income nations does

False

By 2012, the world is home to about how many people?

7 billion

Fertility refers to

The incidence of childbearing in a nation’s population

Which of the following concepts refers to the maximum possible childbearing women?

Fecundity

Which of the following concepts refers to the number of live births in a given year for every 1,000 people in a population?

Crude birth rate

One region of the world has both the highest birth rate and the highest infant mortality rate. Which is it?

Asia

In global perspective, the crude birth rate of high income nations such as the United States is

Below average

Among which of the following categories of the U.S. population is fertility low?

Asia American

Which of the following four statements about migration is NOT true?

Migration has little or no effect on population size

Looking at countries around the world, what is the relationship between average income level and rate of population increase?

The lower the average income, the greater the population increase

The demographic measure called the "sex-ratio" refers to

The number of males for every 100 females in the population

Why are sex ratios usually below 100?

Because women typically outlive men

If a nation has a sex ratio of 108, as India does, it is very likely that parents there

Value sons more than daughters

If you were to examine an age-sex pyramid for a low-income nation, you would expect to see which of the following patterns?

A wide base, indicating a high birth rate

Throughout most of human history, families had many children because

All of these responses are correct

Which of the following is evidence of the shortage of a fresh water not found around the world?

All of these responses are correct

Currently, about how much of the global population increase is taking place in low-income nations?

98%

Malthusian argued that

All of these responses are correct

The basic idea behind demographic transition theory is

Population patterns reflect a society’s level of technological development

Mounting evidence suggests that the average temperature of the planet is

Rising

In the United States, the birth rate is currently

At about the replacement level

The concept "zero population growth" refers to the level of reproduction that

Maintains population at a steady level

Which of the following statements expresses the "limits to growth" thesis?

We are rapidly consuming the Earth’s finite resources

In most poor nations of the world today, what is the average number of children born to a woman?

Three

In low-income countries, increasing opportunities available to women are likely to

All of these are correct

The concept "environmental deficit" refers to

Long-term harm to the environment caused by a short-sighted focus on material affluence

Urban decentralization has led to

All of these responses are corrections

If you were to compare Sunbelt cities, such as Houston, to Snowbelt, such as Detroit, what differences would you find?

Sunbelt cities generally have larger populations and are larger in physical size

Which of the following concepts refers to the study of the interaction of living organisms and the natural environment?

Ecology

According to Emile Durkheim, while traditional, rural societies were built on ___, modern urban societies are held together by ___

Likeness; difference