Population and the Environment | AQA A-Level Geography (7037)

Population and the Environment

322 questions
25 subtopics
Component 2 Section C: one of three
Component 2

How the physical environment shapes where people live and what they eat, the relationship between population and health, and the models used to describe population change and its limits.

One of three Section C options in Component 2.

Sample questions from Population and the Environment

Answer each one closed book first, then open the answer.

The Physical Environment and Population

Define population density.

Show the answer
The number of people per unit area, typically expressed as persons per square kilometre.
Zonal Soils: Chernozems and Latosols

What type of agriculture do chernozems typically support?

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Large-scale commercial grain production, particularly wheat and maize.
The Dimensions of Food Security

How does expansion of cultivated area increase food availability?

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Bringing new land into agricultural production increases the total amount of food that can be grown.
Physical Environment and Disease

Why do low-lying areas with poor drainage have higher disease vector populations?

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Poor drainage creates stagnant water bodies that serve as breeding sites for disease vectors such as mosquitoes.
Global Health Initiatives and Disease Studies

What is the purpose of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria?

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To mobilise and invest funding to support programmes targeting these three diseases in low and middle-income countries.
Migrant Types and Causes of Migration

How can natural disasters act as an environmental cause of international migration?

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Events such as earthquakes, floods, and hurricanes can force people to leave their homes and countries.
Optimum Population and Resource Demand

Why is optimum population considered dynamic rather than fixed?

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Because it changes as technology, resource availability and economic conditions alter over time.
Climate Change, Heatwaves and Vector-Borne Disease

Why do death rates rise during heatwaves, particularly among vulnerable populations?

Show the answer
Thermal stress overwhelms the body's ability to regulate temperature, leading to heat exhaustion, heatstroke, and exacerbation of existing cardiovascular and respiratory conditions, causing elevated mortality.

The 25 subtopics

One subtopic is one session. Work down the list.

Subtopic	What it covers	Questions
The Physical Environment and Population	Recall questions on climate, soils and the distribution of resources such as water as influences on population.	20
Global Food Production and Agricultural Systems	Recall questions on where food is produced and consumed, net exporting and importing regions, classifying agricultural systems by intensity, output, purpose and technology, yield and labour productivity, and how temperature, precipitation, solar radiation and soil fertility, structure, depth, pH and organic matter affect farming.	18
Tropical Wet and Semi-Arid Climates	Recall questions on the temperature, rainfall, global distribution, farming and population densities of tropical wet (Köppen Af) climates, and on the rainfall, temperatures, distribution, human activities and low population densities of semi-arid (Köppen BS) climates.	10
Zonal Soils: Chernozems and Latosols	Recall questions on the A horizon, fertility, distribution and farming of chernozems and their importance for food supply, and on the colour, low fertility and distribution of latosols, shifting cultivation and what permanent cultivation on them requires.	10
Soil Erosion and Its Management	Recall questions on what soil erosion is, the human activities that cause it, and how contour ploughing and terracing hold soil in place.	8
Waterlogging, Salinisation and Soil Structure	Recall questions on the causes and management of waterlogging, of salinisation through drainage, drip irrigation, fallowing, salt-tolerant crops and gypsum, and of structural deterioration through organic matter, machinery management, controlled traffic farming, subsoiling and timing of cultivation.	20
The Dimensions of Food Security	Recall questions on the definition of food security and on its availability, access, utilisation and stability dimensions.	18
Studying Climatic Types and Zonal Soils	Recall questions on why two climatic types and two zonal soils must be studied and on what should be understood about each.	8
Health, Morbidity and the Epidemiological Transition	Recall questions on the WHO definition of health, mortality and morbidity and how they differ between low- and high-income countries, and on the epidemiological transition, its ages of pestilence and famine, receding pandemics and degenerative diseases, and its economic and social drivers.	11
Physical Environment and Disease	Recall questions on how climate, topography and poorly drained low-lying land affect disease, on air pollutants, their sources and the health conditions linked to them, and on water quality and the diseases it causes.	8
Malaria: Distribution, Impacts and Management	Recall questions on malaria and its transmission vectors, its regional, latitudinal and seasonal distribution, the temperature, altitude, humidity and socio-economic factors affecting it, its health and economic impacts, and its management and mitigation strategies.	14
Coronary Heart Disease and Non-Communicable Diseases	Recall questions on non-communicable diseases and coronary heart disease, its global prevalence, the physical environment, socio-economic and lifestyle factors linked to it, its health impacts, and management and population-level mitigation strategies.	11
Global Health Initiatives and Disease Studies	Recall questions on the World Health Organization, international agencies, Médecins Sans Frontières, NGOs and the Global Fund and the challenges they face, and on what an in-depth study of a biologically transmitted disease such as malaria and of a non-communicable disease must cover.	13
The Demographic Transition Model	Recall questions on the stages of the demographic transition model and their birth rates, death rates and growth, on crude birth and death rates, natural change and infant mortality, and on why models of population change apply differently with income, healthcare, education and economic development.	18
Fertility, Population Structure and the Demographic Dividend	Recall questions on total fertility rate, life expectancy and age-sex composition, expansive, constrictive and stationary pyramids, religion, social norms, gender roles and marriage customs as cultural controls, pro- and anti-natalist policies, the Demographic Dividend and the dependency ratio.	16
Migrant Types and Causes of Migration	Recall questions on refugees, asylum seekers and economic migrants and why the distinction matters, on natural disasters, climate change, desertification, sea level rise and resource depletion as environmental causes of international migration, and on poverty, unemployment, limited services, conflict and persecution.	14
Push and Pull Factors in Migration	Recall questions on push and pull factors, the processes involved in migrating and the demographic effects on source countries.	13
The Components of Population Change	Recall questions on the parts played by birth rates, death rates, immigration and emigration in changing population size.	8
Optimum Population and Resource Demand	Recall questions on overpopulation, underpopulation and optimum population and why it changes, on how population size and structure affect resource demand and the dependency ratio, and on carrying capacity and what can increase it.	11
Ecological Footprint and Population–Resource Theories	Recall questions on ecological footprint, biocapacity and income, positive and negative feedback in population-resource systems, and on the ideas of Malthus and his positive and preventive checks, the neo-Malthusians, Boserup and Julian Simon, and where they disagree.	17
Ozone Depletion and Human Health	Recall questions on why thinner stratospheric ozone admits more ultraviolet radiation and on the path from DNA damage to skin cancer risk.	8
Climate Change, Heatwaves and Vector-Borne Disease	Recall questions on climate change, rising temperatures and more frequent extreme heat, the physiological strain and deaths heatwaves cause, and on expanding vector habitats at higher latitudes and altitudes, diseases spreading to new regions and emergent vector-borne diseases.	9
Climate Change, Food Supply and Nutrition	Recall questions on how climate change affects growing seasons, rainfall patterns, extreme weather, droughts and floods, pests and diseases and the poleward shift of crop zones, and on how lower yields affect food supply, prices, malnutrition risk and nutritional standards.	13
Global Population Projections	Recall questions on what projections are, the three demographic factors behind them and where growth and decline are expected.	14
Japan's population decline	Japan's population decline as a country case study, covering its falling births and ageing population, the socio-economic and environmental factors behind them, and how Japan has responded through family policy, immigration and technology.	12

Population and the Environment is 322 of the 3,320 questions in the guide.Get the guide, £7

How the guide is worked

Answering a question from memory stores it far better than reading the answer again. The guide runs that as a fixed procedure on one subtopic at a time, about twenty minutes a session.

Step 1 · Closed book
Cover the answers. Work through one subtopic and write down what you can. Leave blanks where you have nothing.
Step 2 · Open book
Go back to the top. Read each printed answer and write it out in full, including the ones you had right.
Step 3 · Closed book again
Same questions, same order, from memory. The gap between pass one and pass three is the session result.

Read the full method, the return schedule and the research behind it.