Short definitions of 51 terms that come up across GCSE Geography. Boards word things slightly differently, so treat these as a starting point and learn your own specification's wording where it differs.
- Abrasion
- Wearing away of a river bed, river bank or cliff by rock fragments carried by water, ice or waves scraping and grinding against it. See also: Attrition, Erosion.
- Adaptation
- A feature of a plant or animal that helps it survive in its environment, such as drip tips on rainforest leaves. See also: Biodiversity, Ecosystem.
- Attrition
- Process in which rocks and pebbles carried by a river or the sea knock against each other and break into smaller, rounder pieces. See also: Abrasion, Erosion.
- Biodiversity
- Variety of plant and animal life in a particular habitat or on Earth as a whole. See also: Ecosystem, Deforestation.
- Birth rate
- Number of live births per 1,000 people in a population in a year. See also: Natural increase.
- Climate change
- A long-term shift in global or regional weather patterns, currently linked mainly to rising levels of greenhouse gases. See also: Greenhouse effect, Mitigation.
- Constructive plate margin
- A boundary where two tectonic plates move apart and magma rises to fill the gap, forming new crust. See also: Destructive plate margin, Tectonic hazard.
- Contour
- A line on a map joining points of equal height above sea level. See also: Grid reference.
- Deforestation
- Removal of trees from a forested area, for example for farming, logging or building. See also: Biodiversity, Sustainable development.
- Deposition
- Dropping of material that a river, the sea or the wind has been carrying, which happens when the energy of the moving water or air falls. See also: Erosion, Longshore drift.
- Destructive plate margin
- A boundary where a denser oceanic plate moves towards another plate and sinks beneath it, often producing volcanoes and earthquakes. See also: Constructive plate margin, Tectonic hazard.
- Development
- Progress of a country or region in economic terms and in measures of people's wellbeing, such as health and education. See also: GDP, Sustainable development.
- Drainage basin
- Area of land from which a river and its tributaries collect water. See also: Watershed, Lag time.
- Ecosystem
- A community of living things and the non-living environment they interact with, such as a pond or a rainforest. See also: Biodiversity, Adaptation.
- Epicentre
- Point on the Earth's surface directly above the focus of an earthquake. See also: Focus, Tectonic hazard.
- Erosion
- Wearing away and removal of rock and soil by moving water, ice, wind or waves. See also: Abrasion, Weathering.
- Fieldwork
- Geographical investigation carried out in the real world, where you collect data first hand to answer an enquiry question. See also: Primary data, Sampling.
- Focus
- Point underground where an earthquake begins, where the energy is first released. See also: Epicentre.
- GDP
- Gross domestic product: the total value of goods and services produced within a country in a year. See also: Development.
- Gentrification
- Process in which wealthier people move into an area and improve its housing, often raising prices and rents. See also: Urbanisation, Suburbanisation.
- Globalisation
- Growing connection between countries through trade, travel, communication and the movement of money and ideas. See also: Newly emerging economy.
- Greenhouse effect
- Trapping of heat in the atmosphere by gases such as carbon dioxide and methane, which keeps the Earth warmer than it would otherwise be. See also: Climate change.
- Grid reference
- A way of giving a location on a map using numbers: the easting (along the bottom) is read first, then the northing (up the side). See also: Contour.
- Hard engineering
- Building structures such as sea walls or dams to control natural processes. See also: Soft engineering.
- Hydraulic action
- Force of water pushing into cracks in rock or a river bank, compressing air and weakening the material. See also: Abrasion, Erosion.
- Infrastructure
- Basic systems a place needs to function, such as roads, railways, water supply, power and communications. See also: Development.
- Lag time
- Gap between the highest rainfall and the highest river discharge, shown on a flood hydrograph. See also: Drainage basin.
- Longshore drift
- Movement of sand and pebbles along a coast as waves arrive at an angle but the backwash runs straight down the beach. See also: Deposition, Spit.
- Median
- Middle value when a set of numbers is arranged in order. See also: Secondary data.
- Megacity
- A city with an extremely large population, far bigger than an ordinary large city. See also: Urbanisation.
- Migration
- Movement of people from one place to live in another. See also: Urbanisation.
- Mitigation
- Action taken to reduce the causes or severity of a problem, for example cutting greenhouse gas emissions. See also: Climate change.
- Natural increase
- Difference between the birth rate and the death rate, ignoring migration. See also: Birth rate.
- Newly emerging economy
- A country that is experiencing fast economic growth, often with a growing industrial sector, but is still developing. See also: Globalisation, Development.
- Population density
- Average number of people living in a unit of area, usually per square kilometre. See also: Megacity.
- Primary data
- Information you collect yourself, for example by counting, measuring or interviewing. See also: Secondary data, Fieldwork.
- Renewable energy
- Energy from sources that are naturally replaced, such as wind, solar and tidal power. See also: Sustainable development.
- Resource
- Anything from the environment that people use, such as water, soil, fuel or minerals. See also: Renewable energy.
- Sampling
- Choosing a smaller group of sites or people to study instead of measuring everything, to save time while still reflecting the whole. See also: Fieldwork, Primary data.
- Secondary data
- Information that someone else has already collected, such as census figures or published maps. See also: Primary data.
- Soft engineering
- Managing natural processes by working with nature, for example beach nourishment or planting vegetation. See also: Hard engineering.
- Spit
- A long, narrow ridge of sand or shingle that extends from the coast into the sea, formed by longshore drift where the coastline changes direction. See also: Longshore drift.
- Suburbanisation
- Outward growth of towns and cities into residential areas around their edges. See also: Urbanisation, Gentrification.
- Sustainable development
- Development that meets the needs of people today without reducing the ability of future generations to meet their own. See also: Renewable energy, Development.
- Tectonic hazard
- A threat to people caused by movement of the Earth's crust, such as an earthquake, volcanic eruption or tsunami. See also: Epicentre, Destructive plate margin.
- Traction
- Way large stones are rolled along a river bed by the force of the water. See also: Erosion, Deposition.
- Tributary
- A smaller stream or river that flows into a larger river. See also: Drainage basin.
- Urbanisation
- Increase in the proportion of a population living in towns and cities. See also: Migration, Megacity.
- Watershed
- Edge of high land that separates one drainage basin from the next. See also: Drainage basin.
- Wave-cut platform
- A flat area of rock at the foot of a cliff, left behind as the cliff is eroded and retreats. See also: Erosion.
- Weathering
- Breakdown of rock where it is, without it being moved, caused by weather, plants or chemical reactions. See also: Erosion.
Ready to use them? Try the geography quiz or read the revision guide.
Part of the GCSE Geography revision set: the revision guide and self-marking quiz.