Age and Sex Structures

DEMOGRAPHIC
TRANSITION
Demographic transition (DT)
 Is the transition from high birth and death rates to lower birth
and death rates as a country or region develops from a pre-
industrial to an industrialized economic system.
The theory was proposed in 1929 by the
American demographer Warren Thompson,[who observed changes,
or transitions, in birth and death rates in industrialized societies over
the previous 200 years.

 Most developed countries have completed the demographic

transition and have low birth rates; most developing
countries are in the process of this transition
The major (relative) exceptions are some poor countries, mainly in
sub-Saharan Africa and some Middle Eastern countries, which are
poor or affected by government policy or civil strife, notably,
Pakistan, Palestinian territories, Yemen, and Afghanistan.

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 2

• Population growth can occur only if:
– Natural increase is positive

B > D B increases or D declines

⇒
and/or
– Net migration is positive
I > E ⇒ I increases or E declines

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 3

• >> Movement of death and birth rates in a
society, from a situation where both are high
(in the pre-transition stage) to one where both
are low (in the post-transition stage).
• >> Transition is the interval between these
two stages during which the population
increases oftentimes rapidly, as births exceed
deaths.

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 4

 STAGE 1
• Before the start of the DT
– life was short, births were many, growth
was slow and the population was young
• At the end of the stage: Birth and death rates
close again. Low population growth with
fluctuations

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 5

• STAGE 2: With declining mortality, the population
becomes younger because more children survive
– Improved living conditions and health practice ⇒
population explosion

• STAGE 3: Fertility decline reduces the

of children.
proportion Successive generations become
similar in size (parents = children).
– Fertility decline, Population growth remains high at
the beginning but falls near 0 at the end of the stage

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 6

• STAGE 4: With continuing fertility decline, the
relative number of children reduces and the
older population becomes more important
(high life expectancy).
– At the end of the DT Birth and death rates are
close again. Low population growth with
fluctuations

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 7

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 8
STAGE 5
 The original Demographic Transition model has just four
stages, but additional stages have been proposed. Both
more-fertile and less-fertile futures have been claimed as
a Stage Five.

 The above is because the simplest demographic

transition models predicted that birth rates will continue to
go down as societies grow increasingly wealthy.
However, recent data contradicts these models,
suggesting that beyond a certain level of development
birth rates increase again, hence stage 5 of the transition

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 9

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 10
 AGE AND SEX

• Age and Sex are two important variables

consider
to in a population’s structure.
• Both affect fertility, mortality and migration.
• Population pyramids are a tool we can use
summarize to and visualize a population’s age
and sex structure quickly and easily.
• A population pyramid shows the age and sex
structure of a given population at a given
time.

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 11

 Age Structure

•
– Demographers display the age structure of a
population by constructing a graph in which the
population size in each age band is depicted by a
horizontal bar that extends from a centerline to
the left for one gender and to the right for the
other, with the age bands arranged from lowest
(at the horizontal axis) to highest.

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 12

 Tanzania

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 13

 Nigeria

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 14

 India

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 15

 China

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 16

 Germany

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 17

 Qatar

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 18

 Sweden

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 19

 USA

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 20

 World

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 21

 Age Structures
 Today we observe basically three types
of population age structures: these are
shown as percent of total population by
sex and they are called population
pyramids
 Definitions of these can be clearly had
by a look at their shapes.

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 22

Young age structures
 It has a broad base (at young ages)
tapering fast to the top (oldest ages)
 It is a real pyramid in the demography
nomenclature

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 23

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 24
Old age structures
 The contrast of young structures are old age
structures, typical of Europe and Japan, with
most of the population at older ages and a
‘reducing’/caving-in bottom.
 The contrast can be clearly observed by
superimposition of the two types for each sex.
Indeed one sex (either males or females)
suffices since the age distributions are virtually
‘symmetrical’, as the pyramids show, although
higher female survival adds a bit more women

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 25

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 26
7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 27
7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 28
Transitional age structures
 The third type, lies between the two,
what can be called transitional age
structures: neither young as those of
Africa, nor old as those in Europe;
 Described in another way, at older ages
they have ‘young’ shapes, but not so
broad at young ages; these are
observed in most of Asia and Latin
America

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 29

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 30
7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 31
…
 In sum Africa contrasts with all the others: while Africa has a
broad base, the others cave in at the bottom, especially
Europe.
 Africa with almost half of its population (46 percent: males+
females) aged less than 15 years and only less than 4
percent at old ages of 65 years and above, contrasts sharply
with Europe with only less than 16 percent, and notably equal
at the old ages also; that is why we say European populations
are old age structures.
 The rest of the populations are in the traditional labour force
ages of 15 to 64: only 55 percent for Africa, with Europe (for
now at least) having an enviable structure. Asia, and Latin
America with the Caribbean are enviable too by having
neither too young nor too old populations.

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 32

 Age and Sex Ratios
• Sex composition
– Another fundamental demographic characteristic of a
population is its sex ratio (generally expressed as the
– number of males per 100 females).
A strongly unbalanced sex ratio affects the availability
of marriage partners, family stability, and many
aspects of the social, psychological, and economic
– structure of a society.
Sex ratios are affected by events such as major wars
and large-scale migration, by cultural pressures that
favor one sex, usually males, by unequal mortality
rates in adulthood, and by changes in the birth rate.
7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 33
 Age and Sex Ratios

• Measures of sex structure

– There are three main measures of sex structure,
and they are highly related one with the other.
1) the masculinity proportion,
2) the ratio of the excess or of males
deficit
to the total population, and
3) the sex ratio

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 34

 Age and Sex Ratios
• The masculinity proportion
– Commonly used in nontechnical discussions of sex
composition and is calculated by dividing the number of
males in the population by the number of males and
females, and multiplying the result by 100, as follows:
Pm
MP  100
Pt

• where Pm is the number of males, and Pt is the total population.

• Obviously, 50 is the point of balance; an MP
figure
higher than 50 represents an excess of males, and
one
7/23/20
lower than 50, an excess of females.
DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 35
 Age and Sex Ratios
• The sex ratio
– The sex ratio (SR) is the most popular index of sex
composition in demographic and other scholarly
analyses.
– It is usually defined as the number of males per
100 females:
Pm
SR  100
Pf

– The sex ratio is by far the most widely used

measure of sex composition in demography

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 36

 Age and Sex Ratios
• A sex ratio above 100 indicates an excess of
males, and one below 100 an excess of
females.
• National sex ratios to fall in the narrow
range
tend from about 95 to 102, barring special
circumstances, such as a history of heavy war
losses (less males), or heavy immigration
(more males); national sex ratios outside the
range of 90 to 105 should be viewed as
extreme.

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 37

 Age and Sex Ratios

• The greater the abrupt deviation or

of sex ratios from 100,
departure the greater the
potential for errors in the data.
• Most societies have sex ratios
at birth (SRBs) between 104
and 106, i.e., 104-106 boys are
• born for every 100 girls.
Thisevolutionary
an so-called biologically
adaptationnormal SRBfact
to the is likely
that
females have higher survival probabilities than
males

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 38

 Age and Sex Ratios

• Sex Ratio of Births—Number of male births

per 100 female births
Number of Male Births
 100
Number of Female Births

• Ratio < 100 →More female than male births

= 100 → Same number of male and
female births
> 100 → More male than female births

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 39

 Age and Sex Ratios
• Sex Ratio of Deaths
Number of Male Deaths
 100
Number of Female Deaths
• Much more variable from area to area than sex
ratio at birth
• Often well above 100, i.e. males have a higher
mortality
• Important characteristics to include in further
analyses are age, race, ethnic group, residence,
marital status, and occupation
7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 40
 Age and Sex Ratios
• Sex Ratio of Migrants
Number of Male Migrants
 100
Number of Female Migrants
• Shows more extreme values than sex ratio of
either birth or death
• Less uniform from area to area
• Patterns of sex-selectivity of migrants vary
depending largely on types of occupational
opportunities and on cultural factors

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 41

 Age and Sex Ratios

• Age
– Demographers’definition of age— age, i.e.
Completed age of an individual at last
birthday
• Most important variable in demographic analyses
• Data on age may be secured by
– Asking a direct question on age
– Asking a question on date of or month and year
birth,
– of birth
Or a combination of these
7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 42
 Age and Sex Ratios
• Age-Reporting Errors
• Centenarians
– Those close to 100 years tend to their
overestimate
• age
Understatement
• – Women tend to understate their age
– Mothers tend to round up the age of
Overstatement their children
• Heaping/Digit preference
– People tend to report certain ages at the expense of
others
– Can occur at any digit but happens most often with 0
and 5
7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 43
 Age and Sex Ratios
• Distributing unknown and/or unreported age
– Needs to be imputed with care
• Coverage—Missed or counted twice
– There is a tendency to miss the people in certain
age groups (e.g. young men)
– Some people are counted twice

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 44

 Age and Sex Ratios

• Method for Detecting the Extent of Age Errors

• Age ratios used to estimate data quality
– Two formulas available:
– Let ax = number of persons of age x
ax
100
1
a x -1 a x 1 
2
ax
– Or 100
1
a x -1  a x  a x 1 
3
7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 45
 Age and Sex Ratios

• The age ratio is then:

– Compared to 100
– Plotted by single year of
– age
Indices and methods have been developed to
summarize the preference of or avoidance of
particular terminal digits, e.g. Whipple’s index,
Myer’s blended method

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 46

 Age and Sex Ratios
• Correction of Age Errors
• Grouping
– Generally by 5 or 10 years
– Avoid problem of fluctuations in single year data
• Interpolation
– To be developed later
• When working with several populations,
comparison of age distributions is a classic
demographic analysis

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 47

 Age and Sex Ratios
• Age
– P0-14 =Proportion of children under 15
– P65+ = Proportion of aged persons
– P15-64 = Proportion of persons of “working age”
• Age Dependency Ratio
– Age-Dependency Ratios—Proportion of children
less than 15 and elderly 65+ relative to the
population of “working ages”
P014 P59
ADR  100
P1559

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 48

 Age and Sex Ratios
• Child-Dependency Ratio—Proportion of
children less than 15 relative to the
population of “working ages”

CDR  P014 100

P1559

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 49

 Age and Sex Ratios

• Old-Age Dependency Ratio—Proportion of

adults over age 65 relative to the population
of “working ages”

ODR  P 60 100
P1559

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 50

 Age and Sex Ratios
• The ratio of the excess or deficit of
males
to
– the
The total population
ratio of the excess, or deficit, of males to the
total population is obtained by subtracting the
number of females from the number of males,
dividing by the total number in the population,
and multiplying by 100, as follows:
Pm  Pf
ED 100
Pt
• where Pm is the number of males, Pf is the number of
females, and Pt is the total population.

7/23/20 DEMOGRAPHIC METHODS Chapter 2 51