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This chapter discusses some of the principal factors that have conditioned changes in the demography of India. The demographic trends at the regional and national level are examined, followed by a discussion of the likely consequences of current population trends. The last section of the chapter includes comments on recent work that has attempted to explain demographic change. Population growth, mortality, and fertility are some topics covered in this chapter.

This chapter shows that significant progress has been made in developing the methodological tools needed to assess variations in incidence rates of drug use and prevalence trends over time. Topics discussed include the current scope of drug use, population prevalence estimates, trends in drug use, prevalence of drug use by young persons, trends in youth drug use, variations in drug use within populations, injection drug use, and individual trajectories and drug use careers. Drug use and its related problems do not occur randomly. Some nations and some neighbourhoods are more likely at times to experience high rates of drug use, and some individuals are more likely to initiate and continue heavy drug use. The fact that problem drug use is most often interwoven in a complex network of other social problems, both at the individual level and at the societal level, implies that strategies to prevent drug use or drug-related harms need to address this complexity.

The reconstruction of the northern-herd population trajectory places the herd at a hypothetical 5,000-6,000 before 1872; rising to a censused 27,800 in 1914; declining to a censused 3,172 in 1968; increasing during natural-regulation policy to a censused 12,859-19,045 and estimated 21,071-25,920 in the 1980s-1990s; and declining in the early 2000s. Major forces driving population trend were (hypothetically) aboriginal hunting and large carnivores maintaining low numbers prior to park establishment; park protection from 1872-1920s allowing a major increase; park control and outside hunting from 1920s-1968 reducing herd size; natural-regulation policy (no park control) from 1969-present, again permitting increase. Synthesis of elk effects on the northern-range ecosystem in the following chapters examines all the evidence for a three-way, quasi-experiment: (1) condition and trend of ecosystem components and processes during two periods with the herd below 6,000 (pre-1872-1884 and 1959-1970) and two periods with numbers above 6,000 (1885-1958 and 1971-present); (2) condition and trend of system inside and outside eight 2.1 ha exclosures built in 1957 and 1962; (3) condition and trend of system inside and outside park boundaries.

The trends that have shaped the industry and social structure of the United States have also fashioned New York City and its neighborhoods. This chapter traces the course of the city's economic and political development and the particular conditions which formed Greenpoint–Williamsburg. Greenpoint–Williamsburg does not have defining geographic characteristics, but certain population trends differentiate it clearly from surrounding areas. These same characteristics of the population affect political development and the composition of protest movements.

This chapter describes population obesity trends from descriptive epidemiologic studies. Topics covered include obesity trends in U.S. adults, obesity trends in U.S. children, and international obesity trends. There is clear evidence that obesity has reached epidemic proportions in many parts of the world and is increasing rapidly in developing countries. In many populations, the entire distribution of BMI values has shifted to the right, indicating a dramatic increase in morbid obesity.

This chapter details certain aspects of social provision for old age and, in particular, some of the issues raised by the report of the Phillips Committee. This involves consideration of five other important state documents which, in one way or another, bear on the question of standards of living for old people. All these reports exhibit in common a deep concern about future population trends. The chapter shows that it is difficult to understand why the gradual emergence in Britain of a more balanced age structure should be regarded as a ‘problem of ageing’. It argues that the present alarm is unjustified; that the demographic changes which are under way and are foreseeable have been exaggerated, and that unless saner views prevail harm may be done to the public welfare.

Since the nineteenth century, much of Suisun Marsh has been managed for waterfowl hunting. The marsh supports among the highest densities of breeding ducks in the world. Ducks banded in the marsh are recovered throughout the Pacific Flyway and North America. The marsh annually hosts over 60,000 wintering waterfowl, but current waterfowl abundance is below the population objective of 300,000 wintering ducks and well below the nearly 370,000 waterfowl that wintered there historically. Long-term population trends for dabbling ducks and geese are declining, diving ducks and swans are stable, and sea ducks are slightly increasing. Maintaining the present diversity and abundance of waterfowl in the face of increasing salinities likely will depend on wetland management for high-yielding seed plants.

Early warnings of amphibian declines have been realized as species have vanished, or disappeared from large portions of their ranges. These population declines have alerted biologists and conservation agencies to the need to combine proactive evaluation of status and trends with retroactive research on causes of disappearances. An abundance of baseline data exists in the form of museum voucher specimens. Far from being just specimen “libraries” for systematists, museum vouchers offer a wide range of natural history data for a number of biological disciplines. Under some circumstances (long-term, generalized acquisition of specimens from a specific region), museum specimens offer verifiable historical records that can be used in trend analyses. Under the assumption of equal collection effort per species per time period, collection trends for amphibians can be assessed by comparing percentage of recent captures to historical captures. To determine the utility of this method in identifying amphibian population trends, this chapter analyzes data from four Louisiana museums that focused collection efforts on Louisiana's Florida parishes.

This concluding chapter discusses demographic change in the Philippines during the early Spanish colonial period. The initial impact of Spanish conquest and the types of transformations the Spanish sought to bring to native societies in Southeast Asia and in the Americas were similar. However, the Philippines differed from Spanish America in terms of geographical location, physical configuration, and the character of its natural resources and societies. This chapter considers the factors that may have contributed to low population density throughout the Philippines, and Southeast Asia more generally, in pre-Spanish times, including famines and epidemics. It also examines temporal and regional population trends in the early Spanish Philippines, with particular emphasis on the initial impact of conquest, the demographic crisis of the seventeenth century, and demographic recovery in the eighteenth century. Finally, it analyzes demographic trends in the Philippines in the wider Southeast Asian context, suggesting that the islands suffered greater population decline in part due to the more pervasive nature of Spanish colonial rule.

This chapter reviews population trends over the last two hundred years and population projections to the end of this century. In 2100 the world population will have stabilized but its geographical distribution will have substantially changed compared to 2015. The chapter then discusses the five stages of the demographic transition, and different neo-Malthusian and non-Malthusian theories of the relation between population growth and economic development. It emphasizes in particular the effects of rapid population growth on land and resource availability, human capital formation, population quality, the accumulation of physical capital, employment, wages, and income inequality. The effects of rapid population growth rate over a given period were found to change in line with the population size and density at the beginning of the period considered.

This chapter highlights the remarkable urbanisation of the planet, the growth of multicultural cities and the rise of place-less power. It provides data on world population growth, discusses trends relating to global urbanisation, and presents maps showing where urban expansion can be expected to occur in the coming period. Different aspects of urbanisation are covered including: the growth in the number of megacities; the existence of shrinking cities; the reasons why very large numbers of people are moving to cities; a discussion of who are the urban migrants; and consideration of the nature of dynamic diversity in the modern city. The discussion highlights the fact that cities are bound to become much more multicultural in the years ahead. The chapter notes that the extraordinary movement of people to cities is still not well understood and offers insights on why so many people are moving to cities.

This chapter examines the evidence that can shed light on the demographic impact of Spanish colonial rule on the Philippines and allow comparisons between population trends in the islands with other parts of the Southeast Asian archipelago. Focusing on demographic trends for each major island and region in Luzon and the Visayas, the chapter shows that Spanish conquest and early colonial rule in the Philippines resulted in significant population decline that was more pervasive and prolonged than generally assumed, but varied regionally. The evidence includes early Spanish colonial sources such as letters and memorials written by the first explorers, conquistadors, and priests; civil records like fiscal accounts and censuses; ecclesiastical records; and corroborative evidence derived from records of native traditions and from archaeology. The chapter also discusses some of the problems associated with the use of early Spanish colonial sources for demographic analysis and the role of racial mixing in population losses. Finally, it considers a regional approach for evaluating the early demographic history of the Spanish Philippines.

One of the most significant phenomena of the twentieth century has been Population Ageing. This demographic phenomenon poses unique challenges to every society. The links between demography and the study of Ageing cannot but be overemphasised. Adequate, timely and reliable demographic data is essential for the formulation of policies and action programs for the elderly. Inspite of this, however, insofar as demographic studies are concerned, though a lot has been written on the subject, the Mediterranean Region has never been studied as a separate entity. The present study is an attempt to fill in the present lacuna. Although population ageing is a phenomenon prevalent in all the countries, the ageing of population varies in intensity from one country. In this paper, data pertaining to the 21 Mediterranean countries and the Occupied Palestinian Territories is collated under three separate topics namely: Determinants of population ageing,;Trends in Population ageing; and demographic characteristics of the elderly population

Several species of small seed-eating farmland birds resident in Britain have shown marked population declines over the last 50 years. In most cases, shortage of food during winter and early spring has been implicated. However, some large seed-eating species have increased over the same period. This chapter explores the possible influence of two phenomena that have changed markedly over that period, which may have received insufficient research attention. The first is the increase in the release of captive-reared gamebirds by the commercial shooting industry, and the second is the loss of sources of small seeds at low spatial density, provided historically by weedy overwinter stubbles, and the increase in sources of larger seeds at high density, provided primarily by gamebird feed hoppers and game cover plots. The analyses suggests that the scale of gamebird release is such that the biomass of released gamebirds now greatly exceeds the combined autumn biomass of native seed-eating species, and changes in the density of pheasants Phasianus colchicus released annually show close temporal correspondence with the declines in small seed-eating birds. The chapter also suggests that weedy overwinter stubbles historically provided seeds at a density where small bird species could meet their daily food needs, but large species could not. The shift from low-density to high-density seed sources may have benefited large species to the detriment of small species. Conservation initiatives designed to provide small seeds at low spatial density might be effective in restoring the previous balance between small and large species.

This chapter describes the sampling tools used by researchers to study the northern pike populations of Minnesota. Experimental gill netting and trap netting have been the two principal techniques for sampling fish populations. The experimental gill nets and trap nets are designed to catch different sizes of fish in order to compare pike populations and to study population trends. However, both these methods have the unfortunate effect of killing fish. The chapter then examines modern methods of sampling such as tagging and radio and ultrasonic telemetry. Researchers mark fish with unique identifiers to examine northern pike migrations between water bodies and for mark-recapture experiments designed to estimate population numbers and exploitation rates. Researchers use radio and ultrasonic telemetry to monitor movements, activity patterns, and habitat use of northern pikes.

This introductory chapter provides demographic information about the prevalence of disability among U.S. residents and outlines population trends suggesting rising numbers of persons with disabilities. It also reviews concerns about health care quality in the United States, drawing upon reports of the Institute of Medicine and other sources to describe worrisome quality shortfalls, especially affecting persons with chronic health conditions. It suggests that persons with disabilities confront particular risks of receiving substandard care, along a variety of dimensions of quality and access.

Population ageing is becoming a major issue for international development. At the same time, processes associated with development strongly influence how later life is experienced around the world. This chapter shows that relationships between population ageing and international development are complex and two-way. Beginning with a discussion on the concept of international development, it proceeds to analyse the cause of the world's population ageing and how it varies across different countries. Specifically, it explores how processes of economic and social transformation affect population trends. The remaining part of this chapter examines the potential consequences of accelerated population ageing for future economic performance and other aspects of development.

This chapter examines the impact of Spanish colonial rule on the population of Cagayan. During the colonial period the Cagayan Valley formed the backbone of the Dominican province of Cagayan. Juan de Salcedo first made contact with the inhabitants of Cagayan during his circumnavigation of the island of Luzon in 1572, but he received a hostile reception and continued on his journey without establishing a settlement. Permanent Spanish settlement was established in Cagayan in 1581; by then much of the region had already been allocated in encomiendas. This chapter begins with an overview of Cagayan Valley in 1570, focusing on its physical geography, society, population trends, and settlement patterns. It then considers the Dominican missionaries' conversion efforts in the region, along with demographic trends. It also discusses the possible causes of population decline in Cagayan during the period, including epidemics.