AP Human Geography Study Guide
This is a free study guide plus a 15-question practice test for AP Human Geography. Read the unit-by-unit guide below, then test yourself on maps and scale, population, culture, political patterns, agriculture, cities and economic development. The questions mix multiple choice, select all that apply and fill in the blank. Answer all 15, then check your score and read the explanation for every question.
Which statement describes relative location?
All High School & Admission quizzes
- Practice test · 15 questions
AP World History Study Guide
- Practice test · 15 questions
AP Biology Study Guide
- Practice test · 15 questions
AP Psychology Practice Test
Now make your own
Upload your prep book, slides or notes, or just tell Bo what you want to learn. You do not need a document to start.
All 15 questions at a glance
Prefer to read before you play? Every question in the sampler is listed below. Answers and explanations stay collapsed until you open them.
1. Which statement describes relative location?
- A. The exact latitude and longitude of a place
- B. The name given to a place by its residents
- C. The position of a place in relation to other places
- D. The size of a place in square miles
Show answer and explanation
Answer: C. The position of a place in relation to other places
Relative location describes where a place sits compared with others, such as being two hours from a port or on a trade route. Absolute location uses coordinates. Relative location can change as roads, rail and technology change, which is why geographers pay attention to it.
2. In the demographic transition model, why does population grow quickly in Stage 2?
- A. Death rates fall while birth rates stay high
- B. Birth rates fall while death rates stay high
- C. Both birth and death rates are very low
- D. Medical care disappears
Show answer and explanation
Answer: A. Death rates fall while birth rates stay high
In Stage 2, better food, sanitation and medicine cut death rates, but families still have many children. The gap between births and deaths produces rapid growth. In Stage 3, birth rates begin to fall, and growth slows.
3. Complete the sentence.
The _____ is the average number of children a woman is expected to have, and about _____ is the replacement level in countries with low mortality.
Options for blank 1: infant mortality rate, crude birth rate, dependency ratio, total fertility rate
Options for blank 2: 1.0, 2.1, 3.5, 5.0
Show answer and explanation
Answer: total fertility rate, 2.1
The total fertility rate counts children per woman, while the crude birth rate counts births per 1,000 people. A rate near 2.1 keeps a population stable without migration in low-mortality countries. Above that the population tends to grow, below it, shrink.
4. Which of these are push factors that lead people to leave a place?
Select all that apply.
- A. Better schools in another country
- B. Drought and famine
- C. Armed conflict
- D. A job offer in a destination city
- E. Lack of jobs
Show answer and explanation
Answer: B. Drought and famine, C. Armed conflict, E. Lack of jobs
Push factors make staying hard: conflict, hunger and unemployment. Better schools and job offers elsewhere are pull factors that attract people to a destination. Many moves involve both a push and a pull.
5. Which term describes migration in which people follow relatives or friends who moved to a place earlier?
- A. Forced migration
- B. Transhumance
- C. Counterurbanization
- D. Chain migration
Show answer and explanation
Answer: D. Chain migration
In chain migration, early migrants send back news and help, and relatives follow. It explains why migrants from the same town often settle in the same neighborhood far away. Forced migration happens against a person's will, as in the Atlantic slave trade or in the case of refugees.
6. A fashion trend that starts in a few large global cities and then reaches smaller cities is an example of:
- A. Contagious diffusion
- B. Hierarchical diffusion
- C. Relocation diffusion
- D. Environmental determinism
Show answer and explanation
Answer: B. Hierarchical diffusion
Hierarchical diffusion moves from places or people with more influence to those with less, often from large cities downward. Contagious diffusion spreads outward from a source to everyone nearby, like a flu. Relocation diffusion happens when the people carrying an idea move.
7. Complete the sentence.
When two cultures blend traits into a new, distinct practice, geographers call the result _____.
Options for blank 1: assimilation, syncretism, relic boundary, environmental determinism
Show answer and explanation
Answer: syncretism
Syncretism produces something new, such as a religion that mixes beliefs from two traditions. In assimilation, a group gives up its own traits and adopts those of the majority.
8. Which of the following describes a lingua franca?
- A. A language spoken by only one ethnic group
- B. A language used for trade between speakers of different native languages
- C. A language that no longer has speakers
- D. A language invented for one television show
Show answer and explanation
Answer: B. A language used for trade between speakers of different native languages
A lingua franca lets people with different mother tongues do business or communicate, as English does in aviation and Swahili does across much of East Africa. It does not replace local languages. A language with no speakers is an extinct language.
9. Which of these are centripetal forces in a state?
Select all that apply.
- A. A shared national identity
- B. Ethnic separatism in one region
- C. A common language used by most citizens
- D. Conflict between religious groups
- E. A national transportation network linking regions
Show answer and explanation
Answer: A. A shared national identity, C. A common language used by most citizens, E. A national transportation network linking regions
Centripetal forces pull a country together: identity, infrastructure and a common language. Separatism and religious conflict are centrifugal forces that pull a state apart. Many states have both at once.
10. What is gerrymandering?
- A. Moving a capital city to a new region
- B. Dividing a state into smaller states
- C. Counting a population every ten years
- D. Drawing electoral district boundaries to favor a party or group
Show answer and explanation
Answer: D. Drawing electoral district boundaries to favor a party or group
Gerrymandering shapes districts so that one party wins more seats than its votes would suggest. Two common tactics are packing a rival's voters into a few districts and cracking them across many. A census counts the population, but it is not gerrymandering.
11. Complete the sentence.
A boundary drawn as a straight line without regard for local features is called a _____ boundary.
Options for blank 1: geometric, subsequent, antecedent, relic
Show answer and explanation
Answer: geometric
Geometric boundaries follow lines of latitude or longitude, or straight lines between points. They are common in places where colonial powers divided land by agreement. A relic boundary no longer functions but can still be seen in the landscape.
12. In von Thunen's model, which activity is placed closest to the central market?
- A. Market gardening and dairying
- B. Livestock ranching
- C. Shifting cultivation
- D. Open-pit mining
Show answer and explanation
Answer: A. Market gardening and dairying
Perishable, bulky goods like milk and vegetables are costly to ship, so they are produced nearest the market. Land there is expensive, so farmers use it intensively. Ranching sits in the outer ring where land is cheap and can be used extensively.
13. Which are features of commercial agriculture compared with subsistence agriculture?
Select all that apply.
- A. Machinery and large farms are common
- B. Farm work depends mostly on family labor
- C. Agribusiness companies often own or contract the farms
- D. Crops and animals are grown mainly for sale
- E. Most food is eaten by the farm family
Show answer and explanation
Answer: A. Machinery and large farms are common, C. Agribusiness companies often own or contract the farms, D. Crops and animals are grown mainly for sale
Commercial farming produces for markets and uses machinery, large inputs and often corporate ownership. Subsistence farming feeds the farm family and relies on family labor. Real farms often fall in between.
14. In central place theory, the minimum number of customers needed to support a service is called the:
- A. Range
- B. Hinterland
- C. Threshold
- D. Primacy
Show answer and explanation
Answer: C. Threshold
The threshold is the smallest market that keeps a business open. The range is the farthest distance people will travel to use the service. A shop with a small threshold and short range, like a corner store, can exist in a small town.
15. The Human Development Index combines which three kinds of measures?
- A. Literacy, military size and exports
- B. Population, land area and rainfall
- C. Energy use, tourism and tax rates
- D. Life expectancy, education and income
Show answer and explanation
Answer: D. Life expectancy, education and income
The index blends health, knowledge and standard of living into one number. It gives a wider picture than GDP per capita alone. Two countries with the same income can rank differently if one has better schools or health care.
AP Human Geography study guide: the seven units
AP Human Geography has seven units. Unit 1, thinking geographically, is the smallest at roughly 8 to 10 percent of the exam. Units 2 to 7 each make up roughly 12 to 17 percent: population and migration, cultural patterns and processes, political patterns and processes, agriculture and rural land use, cities and urban land use, and industrial and economic development. That is close to an even split, so no unit is safe to skip. Check the exact ranges in the current Course and Exam Description.
The course is built on a few ideas that repeat: scale, from local to global; spatial patterns, meaning where things are and why; processes such as diffusion and migration; and models that explain patterns, like the demographic transition model, von Thunen's rings and central place theory. For each unit, learn the model, one real place where it works, and one place where it fails. The free-response section rewards exactly that.
What the exam asks and how to use this practice test
The exam has two halves of equal weight. Section I is 60 multiple-choice questions in 1 hour, and a good share of them come with a map, chart, image or landscape to read. Section II is 3 free-response questions in 1 hour 15 minutes, and the questions come with zero, one and two stimuli. At least one asks you to work across scales. Check the College Board's current exam description for the latest format, since details can change.
This practice test has 15 questions across the seven units. It adds select all that apply and fill in the blank, which the real multiple choice does not use, because recalling a term is harder than spotting it in a list. Take it in one sitting, read every explanation, and let a wrong answer point you at a unit. For the free response, practice with a real map or chart: state the pattern in one sentence, name a process that explains it, and give one specific example with a place name.
How StudyPDF builds a study guide and practice tests from your notes
Fifteen questions can show you which units are shaky. They cannot get you ready on their own, and a generic guide rarely matches what your teacher spent three weeks on.
StudyPDF works from your material instead. You upload your textbook chapter, class notes or the review packet your teacher posted, press New material, and StudyPDF builds a study guide and full practice tests from those exact pages. Every question is grounded in your material, and every explanation cites where the answer comes from. You do not have to upload anything to start: you can also just name a topic, like Unit 4 or central place theory, and Bo sets it up with its key concepts, so you can build materials on it. Starting is free.
Written by the StudyPDF team. Last updated 2026-08-19.