demography

American  

[dih-mog-ruh-fee] / dɪˈmɒg rə fi /

noun

1. the science of vital and social statistics, as of the births, deaths, diseases, marriages, etc., of populations.

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demography British  

/ dɪˈmɒɡrəfɪ /

noun

1. the scientific study of human populations, esp with reference to their size, structure, and distribution

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demography Cultural  

1. The quantitative study of human populations. Demographers study subjects such as the geographical distribution of people, birth and death rates, socioeconomic status, and age and sex distributions in order to identify the influences on population growth, structure, and development.

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Other Word Forms

• demographer
  noun
• demographist
  noun

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Etymology

Origin of demography

First recorded in 1875–80; demo- + -graphy

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Explanation

Do you know the population growth rate of your city? The education levels of everyone on your block? Then you're a fan of demography, the branch of sociology that studies human behavior by analyzing statistical information. The word demography comes from two ancient Greek words, demos, meaning "the people," and graphy, meaning "writing about or recording something" — so literally demography means "writing about the people." Like many branches of the sciences, demography began in the 19th century, when the general craze for cataloging information about the world really took off (think Darwin.) A common related word is demographics, referring to the raw statistical data that's used for analysis.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

demography

Throughout the 1960s through to the 1980s, the “doomsday” equation became regularly cited — usually at face value — in textbooks on genetics, ecology and demography.

From Science Daily ● Oct. 17, 2026

"I think we're stagnating too much and we need to develop the economy," Aia Laucina, a 49-year-old employee of the European Commission, told AFP, adding the country needs "to work on demography".

From Barron's ● Oct. 3, 2026

If demography were destiny, then the long-term prospects of these countries’ equities would be dismal.

From MarketWatch ● Sep. 11, 2026

Investors are all wrong about demography, a new study finds.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 11, 2026

In general, then, there was a direct and nearly perfect correlation between demography and ideology—that is, between the ratio of blacks to whites in the population and the reluctance to consider abolition.

From "Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation" by Joseph J. Ellis

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Related Words

• anthropology

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