6.01 Studying Population

• Introduction
• Learn
• Try It
• Task

Introduction

The number of humans on this planet has tripled in just the past 50 years, growing from 2 billion to 7 billion. The current U.S. population is over 300 million. Explore the U.S. Census Population Clock below to see how rapidly the U.S. and world populations are increasing. Why has the population increased so rapidly across the globe? What impact does the growing population have on the Earth and its inhabitants? Will the population continue to increase at its current rate? What does the future hold for population change? Are there any countries that are not experiencing population growth? These are just some of the questions that sociologists explore when studying population.

In the next two lessons, you will learn about demography, which is the study of social statistics (births, deaths, migration, etc.) and the different ways that sociologists approach demographic studies.