Population Distribution and Influencing Factors Based on ESDA

Based on the exploratory spatial data analysis(ESDA) technique and geographic information system(GIS) platform,with statistic data of counties in 2005,this paper confirms that there is a large population density gap between counties in 2005 because the Gini coefficient is 0.55.Population distribution does not change a lot during the past decades,and the southeast China is still much more densely populated than the northwest China.The global spatial autocorrelation of population distribution is obvious because Moran’s I scores 0.42 and local spatial autocorrelation is partly significant.Climate and elevation are still the main natural influencing factors.Meanwhile industrial structure and transportation significantly influence population distribution.Different combinations of natural factors have different effects on population distribution.For a long term,climate and terrain factor stability affect population distribution.But its influence will be weakened by progress of technology.Economic development is the main factor that changes population distribution for a short term.