New Publication | July 02, 2025

Rapid Demographic Changes Reshape Family Structures

Declining birth rates and rising life expectancy are reshaping the size and age structure of families worldwide. A recent study reveals that the question is not only whether these changes will occur, but also how quickly they will unfold. Analyses of real population data from Thailand, Indonesia, Ghana and Nigeria as well as stylized scenarios confirm this trend. In countries undergoing rapid demographic change, people with an age difference of only five to ten years may have drastically different kinship networks. More

July

Scientific Presentations

LabTalks@SocialDemography

Hampton Gaddy from the London School of Economics gives a talk. More

All Events

Conference

MPIDR@IPC2025

Meeting@IPC2025 | July 03, 2025

New IUSSP Panel on Kinship Structures, Dynamics and Inequalities

Introduction to our research groups

Population Dynamics and Sustainable Well-Being

[SPOTLIGHT] | June 25, 2025

Should you Claim Your Pension Early or Wait?

In the US, the later you retire, the higher your monthly pension benefit will be. Researchers have investigated whether this is optimal, given the uncertainties surrounding life expectancy. The results show that delaying retirement poses a particular financial risk to men and low-income groups, and that different decisions are necessary depending on individual circumstances and uncertainty. More

Selected Publications

Dudel, C.; Loichinger, E.; Klüsener, S.; Sulak, H.; Myrskylä, M.:

The extension of late working life in Germany: trends, inequalities, and the East-West divide Demography, 1–23. (2023)

van Raalte, A. A.; Basellini, U.; Camarda, C. G.; Nepomuceno, M. R.; Myrskylä, M.:

The dangers of drawing cohort profiles from period data: a research note Demography, 1–10. (2023)

More Publications

New Issue 2/2025 available | July 01, 2025

The Quarterly German Newsletter

Research Visit | June 04, 2025

Population and Social Data Science Summer Incubator Program 2025

Questions and Answers

Being a Researcher at the MPIDR

Working at MPIDR

Life & Research in Rostock

New articles every week

Jobs & Fellowships

Press Release | April 03, 2025

Gender Role Beliefs Shape Desire for Parenthood

Open Access

Online Available Books

How can we Link NBA Basketball, Physics, and Demography?

Can we predict Steph Curry’s next move on the court?
Last year, Boris Barron started at MPIDR as a research scientist in the Migration and Mobility Department. He is a physicist and specializes in modeling complex systems. While at Cornell University, he and his colleagues developed a methodology to analyze detailed positional information of basketball players in NBA games. Their approach adapted a physics-based approach, Density Functional Fluctuation Theory (DFFT), to provide a general framework to infer subtle aspects of the game. More