A population pyramid with a very broad base and a narrow top indicates
- A.A declining population
- B.A high birth rate and a young population
- C.An equal number of men and women
- D.A high dependency of old people
Correct answer
Explanation
The correct answer is B, a high birth rate and a young population. The width of each bar in a population pyramid shows the share of that age group, so a broad base means that children form a very large part of the population, which happens where the birth rate is high; the narrow top shows that few people survive to old age. Such a pyramid is called an expanding pyramid and is typical of many countries of Africa. Option A is wrong because a declining population gives a narrow base, as in Japan. Option C is wrong because the balance of the sexes is shown by comparing the two sides of the pyramid, not by the shape of the base. Option D is wrong because a heavy old-age dependency appears as a wide top, not a wide base.
Read the full article: World Population: Distribution, Density and Growth
Practice Questions
View allThe density of population is usually expressed as
- A.Persons per square kilometre
- B.Square kilometres per person
- C.Persons per thousand births
- D.Births per thousand persons
Show answer
Density of population is a ratio between the number of people and the area they occupy, and the standard unit is the number of persons living in one square kilometre; it is the simplest way of measuring the pressure of people on land.
Read the full explanation →An Essay on the Principle of Population, published in 1798, was written by
- A.David Ricardo
- B.Thomas Malthus
- C.Adam Smith
- D.Alfred Marshall
Show answer
In this essay of 1798 Malthus argued that population tends to increase in a geometric progression while the means of subsistence can increase only in an arithmetic progression, so growth must be restrained either by positive checks such as famine, disease and war, or by preventive checks such as late…
Read the full explanation →The United Nations observed the Day of Eight Billion, marking the world population reaching eight billion, on
- A.11 July 1987
- B.12 October 1999
- C.31 October 2011
- D.15 November 2022
Show answer
The United Nations marked 15 November 2022 as the Day of Eight Billion, the date on which the world population was estimated to have reached eight thousand million.
Read the full explanation →The replacement level of total fertility rate for India is
- A.1.0
- B.2.1
- C.2.5
- D.0
Show answer
Replacement level fertility is the total fertility rate at which a generation of women exactly replaces itself in the next generation.
Read the full explanation →In which stage of the demographic transition are both the birth rate and the death rate high, so that population grows slowly?
- A.The first or high stationary stage
- B.The second or early expanding stage
- C.The third or low stationary stage
- D.The stage of population explosion
Show answer
In the first stage of the demographic transition the society is rural and agrarian, life expectancy is low, medical facilities are poor and literacy is low, so both the birth rate and the death rate are high and they roughly cancel each other, leaving population almost stationary.
Read the full explanation →