Demographic Data Essay ⋆ Sociology Essay Examples ⋆ EssayEmpire

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Population censuses, registers, and surveys are the primary sources of demographic data, including information about the size, composition, and characteristics of a population or population subgroups.

Censuses

A census is an enumeration of all households in a well-defined territory at a given point in time. In the USA, data from the decennial census are used to apportion Congressional seats in the US House of Representatives, draw new boundaries for legislative districts, and allocate billions of dollars in federal funds to states and local areas. Census data are also widely used by researchers, business groups, and local planners, who use them to monitor population trends, the demand for goods and services, and social and economic inequalities between groups.

Census questionnaires are typically completed by the household head or ”reference” person and may include questions about age, gender, marital status, place of birth, relationship, educational level, occupation, religion, race/ethnicity, or other demographic characteristics.

Registers

Countries with national population registers keep records of individuals from the time of birth (or immigration) to death (or emigration) and update the record over time with life events. In general, population registers are used to record four basic demographic events: births, deaths, marriages, and migration.

Population registers can also be used to monitor changes in a country’s population size and composition, keep track of trends in fertility and mortality, or select random samples of individuals from the population. Data from pre-industrial registers in Europe have been used for historical demographic research on family structure, fertility, and mortality.

The main advantage of a national register is timeliness; demographic events are recorded on a continuous basis, rather than once every 5 or 10 years. Population registers are expensive to maintain, however, and require a high level of cooperation in order to produce high-quality data.

Vital Registration Systems

Like population registers, vital registration systems collect data on a continuous basis, but are generally limited to information about births, deaths, marriages, and divorces. Data on vital events are drawn from birth certificates and other forms that are completed at the time the events occur. Along with basic statistics about the number of vital events that occur in a given month or year, vital registration systems often collect more detailed information on age, racial and ethnic composition, marital status, and other characteristics.

Surveys

Unlike censuses and registers, which enumerate the entire population, a survey is conducted for a sample or subset of the population. Surveys are generally used to collect detailed information about a specific topic, such as labor force trends. Surveys can also be used as a source of demographic data in countries without a regular national census. While most census data are collected by the government, surveys are collected by a variety of governmental and private organizations.

Surveys are often administered using a ”probability” or random sample of the population, so that findings can be generalized to the population as a whole. Data based on a probability sample are subject to ”sampling error,” which indicates the extent to which sample estimates might differ from actual population characteristics.

Surveys are generally divided into two types: cross-sectional and longitudinal. Cross-sectional surveys provide a snapshot of the population and are best for descriptive analyses, while longitudinal surveys ask questions of people at two points in time and are more suitable for measuring causal relationships between variables.

Bibliography:

Bryan, T. (2004) Basic sources of statistics. In: Siegal, J. S. & Swanson, D. A. (eds.), The Methods and Materials of Demography. Elsevier Academic Press, San Diego, CA, pp. 9-41.
McFalls, J. A. (2007) Population: a lively introduction, 5th edn. Population Bulletin 62: 1.
Weeks, J. (2005) Population: An Introduction to Concepts and Issues, 9th edn. Wadsworth/Thomson Learning, Belmont, CA.