{"title":"Birth weights of South African babies. III. Seasonal variation in birth weight.","authors":"E J SALBER, E S BRADSHAW","doi":"10.1136/jech.6.3.190","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1136/jech.6.3.190","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":84321,"journal":{"name":"British journal of social medicine","volume":"6 3","pages":"190-1"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1952-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1136/jech.6.3.190","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"24384933","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This paper is concerned with some aspects of the morphology of man, as they present in relationship to the occurrence of psychiatric disorder. Kallmann in the U.S.A. and Slater in England, among others, have initiated fundamental work, summarized recently by Slater (1950), dealing with the genetic linkages involved in the causation of mental illness, while the sociological, clinical, psychiatric, and especially psycho-analytic literature provides an overwhelming if diffuse body of evidence pointing to the importance of environmental factors. It is not a function of this paper to review this literature; it is necessary only to mention its existence for orientation purposes since the studies which follow will necessarily have to be interpreted in terms of the relative importance of these two fundamental aetiological influences. The present investigation resulted from two assumptions based on the clinical observation of mentally ill patients in a psychiatric hospital. These were firstly, that there is something about the physical appearance of such patients which reflects their relative incapacity to remain emotionally stable under stress, and secondly, that, if this clinical impression be true, then over the length of the patient's life the separate features of his physical appearance on which the impression is based must have resulted from dysplastic or imperfect develop ment at some definite phase of his growth, since such features cannot be assumed to appear sud denly out of the blue. Some of the differentials contributing to the clinical "hunch" have been measured and analysed by Draper and his co-workers (1944) at Columbia University with respect to physical illnesses such as cholecystitis, peptic ulceration, rheumatoid arthritis, rheumatic fever, and migraine. Features of significance in Draper's data are convincing, not only because of the com prehensive nature of his morphological observations, but also because of their ontogenetic basis. This point will be referred to later, but it is worth remark ing here that, in the field of psychiatry, the scientific strictures of the developmental hypothesis in biology ave been largely neglected. Somatotypology has been widely employed by Kretschmer (1936) a d authors to reveal constitutional dysplasias in psychiatric patients but these studies remain largely descriptive, and therefore sterile, in so far as they do hot lead to an increase in understanding of causation and later of rational therapy in mental disor ers. The studies of Sheldon and others (1941, 1942) suffer from the same purely descriptive faults but do at least add one set of useful data to those of Kretschmer, i.e., an analysis of the predominating germ-layer involved in the resulting dysplasia. Both workers, moreover, have pointed to the concordance of emotional, temperamental, and other psychological features of the personality with the constitutional somatotype of the individual examined, each agreeing that the extreme dysplasias in
{"title":"Dysplastic growth differentials in patients with psychiatric disorders studies on the morphology of maturity.","authors":"J W LOVETT DOUST","doi":"10.1136/jech.6.3.169","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1136/jech.6.3.169","url":null,"abstract":"This paper is concerned with some aspects of the morphology of man, as they present in relationship to the occurrence of psychiatric disorder. Kallmann in the U.S.A. and Slater in England, among others, have initiated fundamental work, summarized recently by Slater (1950), dealing with the genetic linkages involved in the causation of mental illness, while the sociological, clinical, psychiatric, and especially psycho-analytic literature provides an overwhelming if diffuse body of evidence pointing to the importance of environmental factors. It is not a function of this paper to review this literature; it is necessary only to mention its existence for orientation purposes since the studies which follow will necessarily have to be interpreted in terms of the relative importance of these two fundamental aetiological influences. The present investigation resulted from two assumptions based on the clinical observation of mentally ill patients in a psychiatric hospital. These were firstly, that there is something about the physical appearance of such patients which reflects their relative incapacity to remain emotionally stable under stress, and secondly, that, if this clinical impression be true, then over the length of the patient's life the separate features of his physical appearance on which the impression is based must have resulted from dysplastic or imperfect develop ment at some definite phase of his growth, since such features cannot be assumed to appear sud denly out of the blue. Some of the differentials contributing to the clinical \"hunch\" have been measured and analysed by Draper and his co-workers (1944) at Columbia University with respect to physical illnesses such as cholecystitis, peptic ulceration, rheumatoid arthritis, rheumatic fever, and migraine. Features of significance in Draper's data are convincing, not only because of the com prehensive nature of his morphological observations, but also because of their ontogenetic basis. This point will be referred to later, but it is worth remark ing here that, in the field of psychiatry, the scientific strictures of the developmental hypothesis in biology ave been largely neglected. Somatotypology has been widely employed by Kretschmer (1936) a d authors to reveal constitutional dysplasias in psychiatric patients but these studies remain largely descriptive, and therefore sterile, in so far as they do hot lead to an increase in understanding of causation and later of rational therapy in mental disor ers. The studies of Sheldon and others (1941, 1942) suffer from the same purely descriptive faults but do at least add one set of useful data to those of Kretschmer, i.e., an analysis of the predominating germ-layer involved in the resulting dysplasia. Both workers, moreover, have pointed to the concordance of emotional, temperamental, and other psychological features of the personality with the constitutional somatotype of the individual examined, each agreeing that the extreme dysplasias in","PeriodicalId":84321,"journal":{"name":"British journal of social medicine","volume":"6 3","pages":"169-77"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1952-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1136/jech.6.3.169","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"24383168","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The object of this communication is to enquire to what extent the reduction in infant mortality during the 20th century may be attributed to changes in family size. This important question was referred to in Volume XIII (Pt II) of the 1911 Census of England and Wales (p. xlix). The census recorded for each married woman the total number of children born alive, and the number living and dead at the time of the Census. This made it possible to relate mortality to family size (but not to order of birth), and it was noted that: Whatever the ages of the parents and the duration of marriage the increase of mortality with number of births is very great, the rates being generally three to five times as high for the largest families as for the smallest.
{"title":"Observations on all births (23, 970) in Birmingham, 1947. VII. Effect of changing family size on infant mortality.","authors":"J R GIBSON, T McKEOWN","doi":"10.1136/jech.6.3.183","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1136/jech.6.3.183","url":null,"abstract":"The object of this communication is to enquire to what extent the reduction in infant mortality during the 20th century may be attributed to changes in family size. This important question was referred to in Volume XIII (Pt II) of the 1911 Census of England and Wales (p. xlix). The census recorded for each married woman the total number of children born alive, and the number living and dead at the time of the Census. This made it possible to relate mortality to family size (but not to order of birth), and it was noted that: Whatever the ages of the parents and the duration of marriage the increase of mortality with number of births is very great, the rates being generally three to five times as high for the largest families as for the smallest.","PeriodicalId":84321,"journal":{"name":"British journal of social medicine","volume":"6 3","pages":"183-7"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1952-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1136/jech.6.3.183","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"24384931","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Hellin (1895) published evidence indicating that the relative frequencies of multiple births conform to a simple mathematical relationship which may be expressed thus: The frequency of triplet maternities is equal to the square of the frequency of twin maternities, and the frequency of quadruplet maternities is equal to its cube. Stated in general terms, if / is the frequency of twin litters, the frequency of litters of size n is equal to fn~l. This expression has since been tested many times. Although discrepancies between predicted and observed values have been noted (Strandskov, 1945), they appear not to have dispelled belief in the validity of the relationship which, it would appear, has now acquired the status of a "law".
{"title":"Relative frequencies and sex distributions of human multiple births.","authors":"R G RECORD","doi":"10.1136/jech.6.3.192","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1136/jech.6.3.192","url":null,"abstract":"Hellin (1895) published evidence indicating that the relative frequencies of multiple births conform to a simple mathematical relationship which may be expressed thus: The frequency of triplet maternities is equal to the square of the frequency of twin maternities, and the frequency of quadruplet maternities is equal to its cube. Stated in general terms, if / is the frequency of twin litters, the frequency of litters of size n is equal to fn~l. This expression has since been tested many times. Although discrepancies between predicted and observed values have been noted (Strandskov, 1945), they appear not to have dispelled belief in the validity of the relationship which, it would appear, has now acquired the status of a \"law\".","PeriodicalId":84321,"journal":{"name":"British journal of social medicine","volume":"6 3","pages":"192-6"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1952-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1136/jech.6.3.192","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"24384934","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
validify the testimony of the patient or the clinical judgement of the author, a clinical trial so conceived violates any or all of three canons of scientific method, as is now becoming recognized widely in all branches of medicine, except perhaps psychiatry. A change of outlook is largely due to the impact of more exacting standards of evidence established at an earlier date in connexion with the assessment of prophylactic measures, partly as a consequence of public controversy over the merits of vaccination. In this context, the term prophylactic calls for no comment. We here employ the expression therapeutic measures in the widest sense, including administration of drugs or convalescent sera, operative and manipulative surgery, diathermy and radiation (deep X-ray, short wave, radium) treatments, occupational and physio therapy (including remedial gymnastics, faradization, massage), rehabilitation techniques. Bradford Hill (1951), who has himself directed a series of therapeutic trials on the now familiar pattern expounded by Greenwood (1935), has lately set forth in clear and simple language some of the essential safeguards of a scientific assessment of remedial measures; and there is no need to recapitulate them in this context. Our aim in what follows is to examine statistical procedures invoked to validate results within a framework of the precautions to which he has drawn attention; but it will simplify our task if we first specify the desiderata. Prophylactic or thera
{"title":"Statistical theory of prophylactic and therapeutic trials. I. Limitations of the unique null hypothesis.","authors":"L HOGBEN, R WRIGHTON","doi":"10.1136/jech.6.2.89","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1136/jech.6.2.89","url":null,"abstract":"validify the testimony of the patient or the clinical judgement of the author, a clinical trial so conceived violates any or all of three canons of scientific method, as is now becoming recognized widely in all branches of medicine, except perhaps psychiatry. A change of outlook is largely due to the impact of more exacting standards of evidence established at an earlier date in connexion with the assessment of prophylactic measures, partly as a consequence of public controversy over the merits of vaccination. In this context, the term prophylactic calls for no comment. We here employ the expression therapeutic measures in the widest sense, including administration of drugs or convalescent sera, operative and manipulative surgery, diathermy and radiation (deep X-ray, short wave, radium) treatments, occupational and physio therapy (including remedial gymnastics, faradization, massage), rehabilitation techniques. Bradford Hill (1951), who has himself directed a series of therapeutic trials on the now familiar pattern expounded by Greenwood (1935), has lately set forth in clear and simple language some of the essential safeguards of a scientific assessment of remedial measures; and there is no need to recapitulate them in this context. Our aim in what follows is to examine statistical procedures invoked to validate results within a framework of the precautions to which he has drawn attention; but it will simplify our task if we first specify the desiderata. Prophylactic or thera","PeriodicalId":84321,"journal":{"name":"British journal of social medicine","volume":"6 2","pages":"89-117"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1952-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1136/jech.6.2.89","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"24367926","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Present-day society urgently needs reliable measures, both local and national, of the health of the people. Declines in death rates undoubtedly indicate great improvements in public health in terms of survival, but do not necessarily represent equal declines in the numbers of the sick and the magnitude of their needs. More precise knowledge is needed of ailments and diseases in specific communities, as a factual basis to administer present services for the sick, to interpret local trends of morbidity, to enlarge the content of epidemiology and translate its findings into preventive measures, and to plan new services in changing conditions or newly developing areas. But this knowledge must be specified in precise terms. "Total" knowledge of a community is an abstract concept, in reality unattainable. Medicine does not deal with the total person, nor does public health administer the total community, but each selects certain features which to the doctor or administrator seem important. In social medicine we must consider it important to seek knowledge concerning the preventable ill-health of communities in order that preventive action may be taken. Since prevention and the measurement of the preventable are aspects of a single process, and since the normal agencies of prevention are local, the laboratory of social medicine is the local community, and its interest is focussed on the social group rather than on individuals. The life and circumstances of the small community or "neighbourhood" are dominant influences on the health of the individual in an urban society. This small definable community we take to be the unit of research: and we judge as important those environmental factors which can foster or impair the life and well-being of the social group. We therefore select for investigation those aspects of social and health experience which relate particularly to the pro motion of the health of the group in its own local environment.
{"title":"The health of an urban community.","authors":"L STEIN, S A SKLAROFF","doi":"10.1136/jech.6.2.118","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1136/jech.6.2.118","url":null,"abstract":"Present-day society urgently needs reliable measures, both local and national, of the health of the people. Declines in death rates undoubtedly indicate great improvements in public health in terms of survival, but do not necessarily represent equal declines in the numbers of the sick and the magnitude of their needs. More precise knowledge is needed of ailments and diseases in specific communities, as a factual basis to administer present services for the sick, to interpret local trends of morbidity, to enlarge the content of epidemiology and translate its findings into preventive measures, and to plan new services in changing conditions or newly developing areas. But this knowledge must be specified in precise terms. \"Total\" knowledge of a community is an abstract concept, in reality unattainable. Medicine does not deal with the total person, nor does public health administer the total community, but each selects certain features which to the doctor or administrator seem important. In social medicine we must consider it important to seek knowledge concerning the preventable ill-health of communities in order that preventive action may be taken. Since prevention and the measurement of the preventable are aspects of a single process, and since the normal agencies of prevention are local, the laboratory of social medicine is the local community, and its interest is focussed on the social group rather than on individuals. The life and circumstances of the small community or \"neighbourhood\" are dominant influences on the health of the individual in an urban society. This small definable community we take to be the unit of research: and we judge as important those environmental factors which can foster or impair the life and well-being of the social group. We therefore select for investigation those aspects of social and health experience which relate particularly to the pro motion of the health of the group in its own local environment.","PeriodicalId":84321,"journal":{"name":"British journal of social medicine","volume":"6 2","pages":"118-51"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1952-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1136/jech.6.2.118","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"24367927","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
BIRTH WEIGHT AND DURATION OF GESTATION That mean birth weight is higher for males than for females has been consistently recorded (for example by Pearson, 1900; Murray, 1924; Martin, 1931; Bakwin and Bakwin, 1934; Anderson, Brown, and Lyon, 1943), and more recently by Karn and Penrose (1951), Norval, Kennedy, and Berkson (1951), and Salber and Bradshaw (1951). There have been fewer investigations of duration of gestation; but in general reported differences between the two sexes have been trivial (Schlichting, 1880; Siegel, 1921; Anderson, Brown and Lyon, 1943; Karn, 1947; Karn and Penrose, 1951). Table I gives mean birth weights of the Birmingham births as 7 57 and 7 31 lb.
{"title":"Observations on all births (23,970) in Birmingham, 1947. VI. Birth weight, duration of gestation, and survival related to sex.","authors":"J R GIBSON, T McKEOWN","doi":"10.1136/jech.6.2.152","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1136/jech.6.2.152","url":null,"abstract":"BIRTH WEIGHT AND DURATION OF GESTATION That mean birth weight is higher for males than for females has been consistently recorded (for example by Pearson, 1900; Murray, 1924; Martin, 1931; Bakwin and Bakwin, 1934; Anderson, Brown, and Lyon, 1943), and more recently by Karn and Penrose (1951), Norval, Kennedy, and Berkson (1951), and Salber and Bradshaw (1951). There have been fewer investigations of duration of gestation; but in general reported differences between the two sexes have been trivial (Schlichting, 1880; Siegel, 1921; Anderson, Brown and Lyon, 1943; Karn, 1947; Karn and Penrose, 1951). Table I gives mean birth weights of the Birmingham births as 7 57 and 7 31 lb.","PeriodicalId":84321,"journal":{"name":"British journal of social medicine","volume":"6 2","pages":"152-8"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1952-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1136/jech.6.2.152","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"24367928","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In this brochure Professor Penrose puts forward one novel, challenging, and highly original idea buried in a banal matrix of tedious metaphor and metalepsis about the behaviour of men in groups and their reactions to micro-organisms and viruses. Those who fail to derive any profit from the analogy between crowd diseases as Greenwood uses the term and crowd disorders as Penrose does may also miss the point which makes the publication of the essay more than worth while. True to the Galton Laboratory tradition, the author assumes that the reader, if also a mathematician, will immediately grasp the statistical theory he advances; and, if not, will be too dumb to do so. This is a pity, because a public of thoughtful people is getting more and more suspicious of statistical generalizations advanced for allegedly adequate theoretical reasons when there is, as for the so-called cube law, merely a somewhat exiguous empirical basis to support them. The Penrose square-root law has also to do with voting; and what follows is an attempt to fill in the argument which the author himself does not deign to elaborate. The elaboration is all the more pertinent because his hope that the reader "will tolerate the necessary introduction of mathematical notation" (p. 6) immediately precedes three gross errors in the formulae which follow, viz.:
{"title":"On the Objective Study of Crowd Behaviour","authors":"L. Hogben","doi":"10.1136/JECH.6.2.159","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1136/JECH.6.2.159","url":null,"abstract":"In this brochure Professor Penrose puts forward one novel, challenging, and highly original idea buried in a banal matrix of tedious metaphor and metalepsis about the behaviour of men in groups and their reactions to micro-organisms and viruses. Those who fail to derive any profit from the analogy between crowd diseases as Greenwood uses the term and crowd disorders as Penrose does may also miss the point which makes the publication of the essay more than worth while. True to the Galton Laboratory tradition, the author assumes that the reader, if also a mathematician, will immediately grasp the statistical theory he advances; and, if not, will be too dumb to do so. This is a pity, because a public of thoughtful people is getting more and more suspicious of statistical generalizations advanced for allegedly adequate theoretical reasons when there is, as for the so-called cube law, merely a somewhat exiguous empirical basis to support them. The Penrose square-root law has also to do with voting; and what follows is an attempt to fill in the argument which the author himself does not deign to elaborate. The elaboration is all the more pertinent because his hope that the reader \"will tolerate the necessary introduction of mathematical notation\" (p. 6) immediately precedes three gross errors in the formulae which follow, viz.:","PeriodicalId":84321,"journal":{"name":"British journal of social medicine","volume":"6 1","pages":"159 - 160"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1952-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1136/JECH.6.2.159","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"63788001","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
With the publication of the first issue of the Demographic Yearbook, a precedent was established in the presentation of comprehensive and sound demographic data for almost every country in the world. The most reliable and recent figures on population, mortality, natality, and migration were collected for the years up to and including 1947, making possible up-to-date descriptions of each country and comparisons of characteristics in different countries. This second issue of the Yearbook continues the main descriptions and further enlarges the field covered in the first issue. It gives a number of basic tables of population composition, economic characteristics, mortality rates, and migration across national boundaries for the years up to 1948 and in many cases up to 1949. Various sources of data are used, but for a number of the tables special questionnaires were answered by government and administrative departments. Undoubtedly the population data thus presented constitute the most comprehensive and up-to-date body of knowledge at present available. Moreover, this issue includes in the text a chapter which analyses regional population trends and attempts some interpretation of them. In addition to the basic tables of the first issue, several new tables are included, some of which will be repeated annually, and others every five years. The subject of special emphasis in this issue, that of marriage and fertility, is one of particular interest to the western countries with their ageing populations. The special tables here presented cover a wider field than the customary summaries of marriage and fertility rates: there are tables of fertility rates by age of father, of births by age of mother and order of birth, and of information concerning surviving children, proportions of children under 5 years of age, and the like. In such a large array of tables from countries differing so widely in their methods of collecting and recording data, it is hardly surprising that discrepancies become apparentdue in some cases to the divergence of ideas and definitions in different countries, and in others to inaccuracies of all kinds. These irregularities are discussed in the text at the appropriate points, and certain steps have been taken to minimize them; moreover, several devices are introduced to safeguard against misinterpretation of the data. One of these devices in connection with population data, takes the form of a code describing the type of estimate from which the data were obtained and indicating the reliability of the estimate. Nevertheless, the non-comparability of figures for many countries detracts to some extent from the value of certain comparisons. In every table curious differences between countries emerge, and it is important to know whether these represent real differences or whether the curious points are only the results of inaccuracies in figures or different definitions of categories. For instance, Table 6, which gives the percentages of
{"title":"Demographic Yearbook 1949-50, Second Issue","authors":"L. Stein","doi":"10.1136/JECH.6.1.76","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1136/JECH.6.1.76","url":null,"abstract":"With the publication of the first issue of the Demographic Yearbook, a precedent was established in the presentation of comprehensive and sound demographic data for almost every country in the world. The most reliable and recent figures on population, mortality, natality, and migration were collected for the years up to and including 1947, making possible up-to-date descriptions of each country and comparisons of characteristics in different countries. This second issue of the Yearbook continues the main descriptions and further enlarges the field covered in the first issue. It gives a number of basic tables of population composition, economic characteristics, mortality rates, and migration across national boundaries for the years up to 1948 and in many cases up to 1949. Various sources of data are used, but for a number of the tables special questionnaires were answered by government and administrative departments. Undoubtedly the population data thus presented constitute the most comprehensive and up-to-date body of knowledge at present available. Moreover, this issue includes in the text a chapter which analyses regional population trends and attempts some interpretation of them. In addition to the basic tables of the first issue, several new tables are included, some of which will be repeated annually, and others every five years. The subject of special emphasis in this issue, that of marriage and fertility, is one of particular interest to the western countries with their ageing populations. The special tables here presented cover a wider field than the customary summaries of marriage and fertility rates: there are tables of fertility rates by age of father, of births by age of mother and order of birth, and of information concerning surviving children, proportions of children under 5 years of age, and the like. In such a large array of tables from countries differing so widely in their methods of collecting and recording data, it is hardly surprising that discrepancies become apparentdue in some cases to the divergence of ideas and definitions in different countries, and in others to inaccuracies of all kinds. These irregularities are discussed in the text at the appropriate points, and certain steps have been taken to minimize them; moreover, several devices are introduced to safeguard against misinterpretation of the data. One of these devices in connection with population data, takes the form of a code describing the type of estimate from which the data were obtained and indicating the reliability of the estimate. Nevertheless, the non-comparability of figures for many countries detracts to some extent from the value of certain comparisons. In every table curious differences between countries emerge, and it is important to know whether these represent real differences or whether the curious points are only the results of inaccuracies in figures or different definitions of categories. For instance, Table 6, which gives the percentages of ","PeriodicalId":84321,"journal":{"name":"British journal of social medicine","volume":"6 1","pages":"76 - 77"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1952-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1136/JECH.6.1.76","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"63787874","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"UNESCO: Report of the Co-ordinating Committee on Abstracting and Indexing in the Medical and Biological Sciences","authors":"","doi":"10.1136/jech.6.1.78","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1136/jech.6.1.78","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":84321,"journal":{"name":"British journal of social medicine","volume":"6 1","pages":"78 - 78"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1952-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1136/jech.6.1.78","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"63787929","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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