generational cohort

(noun)

A group of individuals (within some population definition) who experience the same event within the same time interval. The notion of a group of people bound together by the sharing of the experience of common historical events developed in the early 1920s. Today, the concept has found its way into popular culture through well-known phrases like "baby boomer" and "Generation X".

Examples of generational cohort in the following topics:

  • Demographics of New Markets

    • Demographic profiling is essentially an exercise in making generalizations about groups of people.
    • As with all such generalizations, many individuals within these groups will not confirm to the profile.
    • Critics of demographic profiling argue that such broad-brush generalizations can only offer a limited insight, and that their practical usefulness is debatable.
    • The generational cohort information above, for example, applies primarily to North America (and to Western Europe, to a lesser extent), and it may be unfruitful to generalize conclusions more widely as different nations face different situations and potential challenges.

  • Methods for Researching Human Development

    • A limit to this method is that the artificial environment in which the experiment is conducted may not be applicable to the general population.
    • In a longitudinal study, a researcher observes many individuals born at or around the same time (a cohort) and carries out new observations as members of the cohort age.
    • Also, because members of a cohort all experience historical events unique to their generation, apparently normative developmental trends may only be universal to the cohort itself.
    • This generally requires fewer resources than the longitudinal method, and because the individuals come from different cohorts, shared historical events are not as unique.
    • Microgenetic design studies the same cohort over a short period of time.

  • Introducing observational studies and experiments

    • For instance, researchers may collect information via surveys, review medical or company records, or follow a cohort of many similar individuals to study why certain diseases might develop.
    • In general, observational studies can provide evidence of a naturally occurring association between variables, but they cannot by themselves show a causal connection.
    • In general, association does not imply causation, and causation can only be inferred from a randomized experiment.

  • Confounding

    • In cohort studies, a degree of matching is also possible, and it is often done by only admitting certain age groups or a certain sex into the study population. this creates a cohort of people who share similar characteristics; thus, all cohorts are comparable in regard to the possible confounding variable.
    • Before the experiment begins, the testers will assign the members of the participant pool to their groups (control, intervention, parallel) using a randomization process such as the use of a random number generator.

  • The Asch Experiment: The Power of Peer Pressure

    • Variations of the basic paradigm tested how many cohorts were necessary to induce conformity, examining the influence of just one cohort and as many as fifteen.
    • Results indicated that one cohort has virtually no influence and two cohorts have only a small influence.
    • When three or more cohorts are present, the tendency to conform increases only modestly.
    • The maximum effect occurs with four cohorts.
    • Adding additional cohorts does not produce a stronger effect.

  • Fertility

    • There are a number of different approaches to measuring fertility rate—such as crude birth rate (CBR), general fertility rate (GFR), child-woman ratio (CWR), total fertility rate (TFR), gross reproduction rate (GRR), and net reproduction rate (NRR).
    • General fertility rate (GFR) is the number of births in a year divided by the number of women of childbearing age (usually 15 to 49 years old, or sometimes 15 to 44 years old), times 1000.
    • The TFR (or TPFR—total period fertility rate) is a better index of fertility than the crude birth rate because it is independent of the age structure of the population, but it is a poorer estimate of actual completed family size than the total cohort fertility rate.

  • Conducting a Q&A Session

    • In general, you want to collect the questions for a Q&A session at the end rather than displaying the questions as they occur.
    • You may have a cohort monitor the questions and select the ones to answer.

  • The Nerva-Antonine Dynasty

    • Titus, Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, Antoninus, and Marcus had no need of praetorian cohorts, or of countless legions to guard them, but were defended by their own good lives, the good-will of their subjects, and the attachment of the senate.
    • After some deliberation, Nerva chose Trajan, a young and popular general, as his successor.
    • During his reign, the Empire defeated a revitalized Parthian Empire in the East: Aurelius' general Avidius Cassius sacked the capital Ctesiphon in 164.

  • Depressive Disorders

    • DMDD was added to the DSM-5 in 2013 as a diagnosis for children and adolescents who would normally be diagnosed with bipolar disorder, as a way to limit the bipolar diagnosis in this age cohort.
    • Emotional symptoms such as anxiety, anger, and depression are generally present, and substantial disruption to personal relationships may occur.

  • What Does One Of These Have To Do With The Others?

    • Another approach to the idea of learning communities at a college or university level is the implementation of cohorts.
    • The instructor's role in a cohort is that of a facilitator.
    • The particular learning community depicted here is the University of Georgia's School Library Media Cohort System.