Demography

Demography is the study of the change in the size, density, and composition of human populations over time, and includes analysis of such factors as birth rates and death rates, as well as emigration and immigration.

"The word ‘demography’ was first used in 1855 by a Belgian, Achille Guillard, and in his terms the study included many aspects of humans including general movement and progress (including morals) in civilized countries. He used the vital statistics of birth, marriage, sickness and death from census and registration reports" (reference for quote:Thomas A Ebert, Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon, USA:Demographic Concepts in Encyclopedia of Life Sciences. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.) in his book, Elements de statistique humaine ou demographie comparee. Demography has come to have a wider meaning, and is now used for all statistical descriptions of human life conditions, including illnesses, socioeconomic indicators, and other aspects of living conditions - as long as the statistics refer to the numbers of individual people who exhibit the characteristic in question.

Demographics in Medicine and the allied health sciences

Demographic analysis is an integral part of epidemiology and in health policy. For example, currently there is a Global Burden of Disease project sponsored by the World Health Organization.

FURTHER READING

• MALTHUS: AN ESSAY ON THE PRINCIPLE OF POPULATION. First Edition 1798. Revised and edited version: Malthus: An Essay on the Principle of Population (Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought) by T. R. Malthus and Donald Winch 1992 ISBN 9780521429726

• Demographic Methods and Concepts Donald T. Rowland 2003 ISBN 9780198752639

ACADEMIC JOURNALS SPECIALIZED IN DEMOGRAPHY:

Demography

Population Studies

American Demographics

Demographic Research

European Journal of Population

Asia-Pacific Population Journal

The Turkish Journal of Population Studies

ONLINE FREE RESOURCES

Bibliographic Searchable Database (1986-2000) from Princeton University: Population Index

Website of the Population Reference Bureau, USA: Population Reference Bureau