Answer the following questions in detail (any one): Explain the human factors affecting distribution of population.

Answer: Besides physical factors, many human (economic, social, political and historical) factors decide where people live.

1. Economic factors:

• Agriculture: fertile plains with irrigation support dense population, e.g. Ganga plain, Nile valley.
• Minerals and mining: mineral deposits attract people even to difficult areas, e.g. Chhota Nagpur, gold fields of Western Australia, oil fields of South-West Asia.
• Industrialisation: industrial regions provide employment and attract migrants, e.g. North-Eastern USA, Western Europe, Mumbai-Pune.
• Urbanisation: cities offer jobs, education, health and entertainment, so population concentrates in urban areas.
• Transport and communication: areas well connected by roads, railways and ports are densely populated; population follows transport routes.

2. Social and cultural factors:

• Religious and cultural centres like Varanasi, Mecca, Jerusalem attract people.
• Social customs, early marriage and preference for large families raise population in some regions.

3. Political factors:

• Government policies encouraging settlement or development (new towns, SEZs) increase population; wars, conflicts and political instability lead to out-migration and sparse population.
• Political boundaries and restrictions on migration also affect distribution.

4. Historical factors:

• Regions settled for a long time, like river valley civilisations (Indus, Nile, Huang He), have dense population; recently settled regions like Australia and Canada are sparsely populated.

Conclusion: Physical factors give the base, but human factors such as economic opportunities, technology and policies increasingly decide the distribution of population.