What is a national census?

A census is an official count and survey of everyone living in a country at a given moment, carried out by the government. It counts how many people there are and describes them: age, sex, household composition, housing, occupation, education, ethnicity, language, health and migration. It is a periodic snapshot, usually taken every ten years, and in most countries completion is required by law.

What information does a census collect that vital registration never will?

The census collects the characteristics of the living population: age and sex structure, household size and composition, housing type and quality, occupation and employment, qualifications, ethnicity, language, religion, internal migration and self-reported health. Vital registration records only the events themselves and the few details attached to them, such as the date and place, the age at death and the cause of death. So the structure of a population comes from the census, and the change in it comes from registration.

What is the difference between a de facto and a de jure count?

A de facto count records people where they actually were on census night; a de jure count records them at their usual permanent address. The choice matters for students, seasonal workers, people in hospital, tourists and members of the armed forces overseas, and it can shift the recorded population of a university town or a resort by thousands. Comparisons between two countries are unsafe unless you know which basis each of them used.

CCEA AS-Level Geography 3910

Processes That Shape Fluvial Environments

Topic overview The drainage basin as an open system Storm hydrographs Factors influencing storm hydrographs Annual hydrographs and river regimes River erosion and transportation Deposition and the Hjulstrom curve Erosional and mixed river landforms Depositional river landforms

Human Interaction in Fluvial Environments

Topic overview Why rivers are channelised, and the methods used Environmentally sensitive and sustainable river management The causes of river flooding The effects of flooding on people, property and land

Global Biomes

Topic overview The global distribution of biomes The tundra biome: climate and soils The temperate grassland biome: climate and soils Climate change and tundra ecosystems

Small-Scale Ecosystems

Topic overview Biotic and abiotic components Ecosystems as open systems Trophic structure and ecological pyramids Nutrient cycling and the nutrient cycling model Plant succession and seral stages Climatic climax and plagioclimax vegetation

The Processes That Shape Our Weather and Climate

Topic overview The global energy balance Vertical and horizontal heat transfer in the atmosphere Ocean currents and the transfer of heat Pressure belts, the Coriolis effect and the pressure gradient The tri-cellular model, the global winds, and where it breaks down Jet streams and the upper westerly winds Global patterns of temperature, pressure, wind and precipitation Factors influencing air temperature

Weather in the British Isles

Topic overview How precipitation forms Air masses affecting the British Isles The polar front and the birth of a depression The life cycle of a depression, and its fronts The sequence of weather as a depression passes Anticyclones in summer and winter Isobars, wind, and the front symbols on a synoptic chart Station circles, recognising systems, and satellite images

Global Weather Issues

Topic overview The Pacific in a normal year: the Walker circulation El Niño events and their global consequences La Niña events and their global consequences How tropical cyclones form The structure of a tropical cyclone The impacts of a tropical cyclone on people and property Managing tropical cyclones: prediction, preparation and response

Population Data

Topic overview Census taking, vital registration, and how the data is collected The reliability of the data, and the use made of it

Population Change

Topic overview Fertility and mortality measures, and why crude rates are crude The demographic transition model The epidemiological transition

Population and Resources

Topic overview Overpopulation, underpopulation and optimum population Malthus and Boserup, and how they hold up Fertility policies, and evaluating one

Settlement Change and the Rural-Urban Fringe

Topic overview Defining rural and urban settlement The rural-urban continuum Issues affecting the rural-urban fringe Greenfield and brownfield development Suburbanisation Counterurbanisation

Planning in Rural Environments

Topic overview Why the countryside needs planning protection ASSIs and SSSIs Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty National parks A national park for Northern Ireland: the case for, the case against, and the verdict

Urban Challenges in MEDC and LEDC Cities

Topic overview Economic and social deprivation in the MEDC inner city Re-urbanisation in the MEDC city Gentrification and its consequences Urban growth and informal settlements in the LEDC city Service provision in the LEDC city Economic activity and the informal economy in the LEDC city

Measuring Development

Topic overview Why 'development' resists definition Two economic measures: GDP and GNI per capita Two social measures: infant mortality and adult literacy Two composite measures: the HDI and the Gender Inequality Index Using the measures together to describe global contrasts

Reducing the Development Gap

Topic overview The Millennium Development Goals: aims and framework Evaluating two Millennium Development Goals The 2030 Agenda and the Global Goals How the Global Goals build on the Millennium Development Goals Globalisation as a route to development in LEDCs Aid and development in LEDCs, and judging development in one

Emerging Markets

Topic overview What an emerging market is BRICS and MINT: what the labels group, and why they are contested Why emerging markets have grown, and one economy studied

Data Collection

Topic overview Collecting primary data in the field Sampling methods: random, systematic, stratified and pragmatic Point, line and quadrat sampling Ordnance Survey maps and map reading Photographs and satellite images as evidence Synoptic charts and remotely sensed data

Data Processing

Topic overview Geographical information systems, and mapping techniques Annotated sketch maps, and the graph types Triangular graphs Mean, median, mode and range Spearman's rank correlation Nearest neighbour analysis Chi-squared (A2 only)Location quotient (A2 only)Developing investigative skills, and the conventions of mapping and graphical work

Fieldwork Skills and Techniques

Topic overview Framing a geographical question and designing the enquiry Fieldwork safety, hazards and contingency planning Choosing and justifying sampling techniques for an investigation Collecting quantitative and qualitative evidence Describing and evaluating data collection methods Presenting evidence in cartographic, diagrammatic and graphical form Choosing and applying statistical techniques Analysing evidence and drawing conclusions Evaluating methods, evidence and the limitations of conclusions

Planning and Recording an Investigation

Topic overview Choosing an issue, hypothesis or question Identifying appropriate sources and methods Describing the study area, stating aims, and recording data

Population Data

2 subtopics
6 things to know
Unit AS 2

What Population Data covers

Population data is examined in Unit AS 2, Human Geography. It covers census taking, vital registration, and how the data is collected and the reliability of the data, and the use made of it.

Where it is assessed

Unit AS 2

Human Geography, written examination, 16% of A level.

Check the CCEA specification ↗

The 2 subtopics

Each one has its own page. CCEA AS Geography students sit this topic in the first year.

What you need to know

Answer each one before you reveal it.

Your recallNot started

Key term

What is vital registration?

Key term

Distinguish between national census taking and vital registration.

Key term

Explain why both sources are needed before a rate such as the crude death rate can be worked out.

Key term

Explain why population data is generally more reliable in an MEDC

Key term

What is age heaping, and why does it matter?

Key term

Which groups are most likely to be missed by a census in an MEDC?

Take Population Data further

The same content, four other ways.

Commonly confused

Pairs that lose marks when they are blurred together.

Census vs Vital registration
Census: a full count of a population taken at fixed intervals. Vital registration: the continuous recording of births, deaths and marriages.
De jure vs De facto
De jure: counting people where they usually live. De facto: counting them where they happen to be on the night of the count.

Questions from this topic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

1
What is a national census?
Model answer
A census is an official count and survey of everyone living in a country at a given moment, carried out by the government. It counts how many people there are and describes them: age, sex, household composition, housing, occupation, education, ethnicity, language, health and migration. It is a periodic snapshot, usually taken every ten years, and in most countries completion is required by law.
2
What is vital registration?
Model answer
Vital registration is the continuous, legally required recording of vital events as they happen — births, deaths and marriages, and usually stillbirths and divorces as well. Each event is entered in a civil register, normally within a set number of days of occurring, so the record accumulates permanently and without a break rather than being gathered at fixed intervals.
3
Distinguish between national census taking and vital registration.
Model answer
A census is a periodic snapshot of the stock of population: it counts how many people there are on one particular night and describes what they are like. Vital registration is a continuous record of the flow of events: every birth, death and marriage as it occurs. The census gives the size and structure of the population at a moment; vital registration shows how that population is changing in the years between censuses. Both are run by government and both are compulsory, but one is intermittent and detailed while the other never stops and records only events.
4
Explain why both sources are needed before a rate such as the crude death rate can be worked out.
Model answer
Any rate needs a numerator and a denominator. Vital registration supplies the numerator — the number of deaths registered during the year. The census supplies the denominator — the total population those deaths came from. Neither source can produce the rate on its own, which is why a country with a good census but weak registration, or the reverse, cannot measure its own population change accurately.
5
What information does a census collect that vital registration never will?
Model answer
The census collects the characteristics of the living population: age and sex structure, household size and composition, housing type and quality, occupation and employment, qualifications, ethnicity, language, religion, internal migration and self-reported health. Vital registration records only the events themselves and the few details attached to them, such as the date and place, the age at death and the cause of death. So the structure of a population comes from the census, and the change in it comes from registration.
6
What is the difference between a de facto and a de jure count?
Model answer
A de facto count records people where they actually were on census night; a de jure count records them at their usual permanent address. The choice matters for students, seasonal workers, people in hospital, tourists and members of the armed forces overseas, and it can shift the recorded population of a university town or a resort by thousands. Comparisons between two countries are unsafe unless you know which basis each of them used.

See the rest and revise

What is inside Levo

Six ways to work the same material.

1Closed book

2Open book

3Closed book

See a huge jump in your memorisation

Answer cold, learn it, then prove it stuck. Levo tracks the jump between your first attempt and your last.

Processes That Shape Fluvial Environments

Human Interaction in Fluvial Environments

Global Biomes

Small-Scale Ecosystems

Cram a whole paper in one sitting

Sort every topic into what you know and what you do not, then drill only the weak ones.

In long profile it is .

asymmetricalsymmetricalflat

Blank Blitz consolidates the facts

Rapid timed gap-fills on the terms and numbers you need to recall without thinking.

AChildren grow up among co-ethnic peers.

BThe heritage language remains in daily use.

CMarriage partners are met within the group.

Build It trains answer structure

Assemble a full-mark answer from its marking points, in the order an examiner wants them.

Greenfield means land that has never been built on.

TrueFalse

Test It catches misconceptions

Spot the fault in a statement. The traps are the mistakes students actually make.

721941163128510

Brain Breaks between sessions

Short focus games to reset attention, so the next set lands better than the last.

Population Data revision questions

Is Population Data examined at AS in CCEA Geography?: Yes. It sits in Unit AS 2, which you take in the first year, so it is on the AS paper as well as counting towards the full A level.
What does Population Data cover in CCEA AS-Level Geography?: 2 subtopics: census taking, vital registration, and how the data is collected and the reliability of the data, and the use made of it. Each one has its own page with questions and model answers.
How is Population Data organised?: By the CCEA 3910 specification, subtopic by subtopic, so it matches the order you are taught it in.

Every question in Population Data, on a schedule.

Attempt a question from memory, write the correct version, then attempt it again. Levo records the jump between your first attempt and your last, and brings each question back on the day you are due to forget it.

Start revising, £5 a month See how the method works

Or £46 a year, about £3.83 a month. Cancel anytime.