If you still imagine the Swedes to be all blond and blue-eyed, the guys looking like vikings and the girls like long-haired porn queens, you are wrong. Being far from homogeneous after the second world war, immigration from a number of countries added more hair and skin colours to the people. Sweden received, with respect to the relatively small population of the country, more refugees than nearly any other European country during the wars in former Yugoslavia and east Africa. At present, a considerable part of the population is immigrant or has at least one immigrant parent.
Any description of a "national character" of a people will always generalize and never be just for all. Though, one thing might surprise many visitors who not made the effort to learn Swedish is that nearly everybody speaks good English and is eager to demonstrate that to you.
The following table shows you some numbers on the swedish population.
Birth rate: 11.7 births/1 000 population (1998 est.)
Death rate: 10.78 deaths/1 000 population (1998 est.)
Net migration rate: 1.69 migrant(s)/1 000 population (1998 est.)
Sex ratio: at birth: 1.05 male(s)/female under 15 years: 1.05 male(s)/female 15-64 years: 1.03 male(s)/female 65 years and over: 0.73 male(s)/female (1998 est.)
Infant mortality rate: 3.93 deaths/1 000 live births (1998 est.)
Life expectancy at birth: total population: 79.19 years male: 76.52 years female: 82 years (1998 est.)
Total fertility rate: 1.76 children born/woman (1998 est.)
Nationality: noun: Swede(s) adjective: Swedish
Ethnic groups: white Lapp (Sami) foreign-born or first-generation immigrants 12% (Finns, Yugoslavs, Danes, Norwegians, Greeks, Turks)
Religions: Evangelical Lutheran 94% Roman Catholic 1.5% Pentecostal 1% other 3.5% (1987)
Languages: Swedish note: small Lapp- and Finnish-speaking minorities
Literacy: definition: age 15 and over can read and write total population: 99% (1979 est.) male: NA% female: NA%
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