Elterjedtség

Elterjedtség is a Hungarian term that describes how common or widespread a phenomenon is within a population, area, or domain. It can refer to diseases, practices, ideas, technologies, languages, or cultural traits. In research, elterjedtség is used as a neutral descriptor of how broadly a phenomenon is present.

In epidemiology, elterjedtség typically corresponds to prevalence: the proportion of a defined population that has a specified condition at a given time (point prevalence) or over a period (period prevalence). It is distinct from incidence, which measures new cases over time. Prevalence is influenced by the duration of the condition, the rate of new cases, mortality, and migration. Data sources include health surveys, registries, and administrative records, and prevalence is often expressed as a percentage or per 1,000 or 100,000 people.

Geographical and demographic aspects of elterjedtség consider spatial distribution and differences across age groups, sexes, urban versus rural settings, and socioeconomic factors. Standardized measures help compare prevalence between populations with different structures.

Beyond health, elterjedtség also describes how widespread a technology, idea, practice, or language feature is in a population or region. For example, the elterjedtség of smartphone use or of a linguistic variant can be assessed with surveys, usage data, or corpus analysis.

Limitations include definitional variance, sampling bias, underreporting, and differences in measurement periods. Accurate interpretation requires clear definitions of the population, time frame, and the phenomenon studied.