The Spatial Distribution Of Chinese Population Mortality And Its Relationship With Geographical Environment

Death is one of the three basic processes of population changes.In our country,due to the influence of ideas and the limitation of data sources,the research on death is far less concerned with than reproduction and migration.With the deepening of China’s aging degree since the 21st century,the topic of death and health has received more and more attention,but the research perspective comes more from time series and pattern changes,and the research on influencing factors also focuses on Socio-economic conditions.This article aims to study the provincial spatial distribution of China’s population mortality since the Census in 1982 and its influencing factors,especially the relationship with geographical environmental factors.The provincial mortality data from the last four censuses are used in the study.We first analyze the spatial differences in mortality through map observation and spatial statistical methods;and then uses the geographic detector model and geographically weighted regression to investigate the influencing factors of spatial differentiation,especially geographic environment factors.Finally,the differences between influencing factors of the two parts split by Hu line is discussed.The study finds that:(a)The spatial distribution of mortality levels in China mainly changes from east to west.With the time going by,the boundaries between gradients are constantly blurred.Such distribution and change are mainly driven by socio-economic factors.The development of local economy and society,such as the increase of education years per capita,can decrease the mortality of the region.(b)There is a certain correlation between the geographical environment factors and the regional differences of mortality.Although since the era of industrial civilization,its influence is not as significant as socio-economic factors,the combination of the two can obviously improve their explanatory power.Different geographical environment indicators has different impact direction on mortality.The higher the average annual precipitation,the lower the mortality.While the higher the average altitude,the higher the mortality.(c)There is a relatively strong correlation between the geographical environment factors and the mortality at the advanced age.Some provinces such as Hainan and Xinjiang show prominent low mortality at the advanced age among all regions.(d)The influencing factors of mortality difference are non-stationary in space.The factors in the two parts split by Hu line are different in the order of priority.Socioeconomic factors are dominant in the southeast half,while the northwest half is relatively more affected by natural geographical conditions.