Test 2 Review
Introduction to Sociology
Spring 2010
MULTIPLE CHOICE. Choose the one alternative that best completes the statement or answers the question.
1) At birth, males and females are distinguished by ________, which are the genitals: organs used for reproduction.
A) gender
B) primary sex characteristics
C) sexual chromosomes
D) secondary sex characteristics
2) One norm found everywhere is the incest taboo, which refers to norms forbidding:
A) women from becoming sexually active before marriage.
B) sexual relations or marriage between certain relatives.
C) young children from engaging in sex.
D) old people from engaging in sex.
3) The term "homophobia" refers to fear of:
A) close personal interaction with people thought to be gay, lesbian, or bisexual.
B) one's own sexuality.
C) pregnancy.
D) experiencing sexual attraction to a child.
4) Critics of easily available pornography argue that it:
A) unfairly depicts women as playthings of men.
B) encourages a breakdown in morals.
C) encourages violence against women.
D) All of the above are correct.
5) Sexuality is not just about having sex because sexuality:
A) is an important element of how we think about ourselves and how others evaluate us.
B) plays a part in campus life as well as in the workplace.
C) is an important theme in the mass media.
D) All of the above are correct.
6) The development of breasts in females and deeper voices in males are examples of:
A) primary sex characteristics.
B) secondary sex characteristics.
C) gender norms.
D) All of the above are correct.
7) Sociologists offer several explanations of the fact that the incest taboo is found everywhere. Which of the
following is NOT one of them?
A) The incest taboo limits a family's contact with the larger society.
B) The incest taboo limits sexual competition within families.
C) The incest taboo helps clarify the kinship system.
D) The incest taboo helps define people's rights and obligations toward each other.
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8) Little or no sexual attraction to people of either sex is called:
A) heterosexuality.
B) asexuality.
C) homosexuality.
D) bisexuality.
9) Here are four statements about teenage pregnancy. Which one is NOT true?
A) The sexual revolution did not result in an increase in teenage pregnancy.
B) The United States has a higher rate of teenage pregnancy than other high-income countries.
C) Most teens who become pregnant choose to do so.
D) Teens may be biologically mature but they are not always socially mature.
10) In global perspective, prostitution is most common in:
A) all nations: prostitution is found in every country in about the same degree.
B) low-income nations, where women have fewer economic opportunities.
C) Middle Eastern countries such as Saudi Arabia and Iran, where women have fewest choices about their
lives.
D) high-income nations, where women are free to choose their profession.
11) Elite prostitutes young, attractive, and well educated are referred to as ________; while ________ are at the
bottom of the sex-worker hierarchy.
A) call girls; brothel workers
B) brothel workers; streetwalkers
C) streetwalkers; call girls
D) call girls; streetwalkers
12) One of the following statements about rape is NOT true. Which one is it?
A) Most men who rape men are not homosexual.
B) Many rapes are not reported to the police.
C) In most cases of rape, the victim does not know the attacker.
D) Official rape statistics include only victims who are women.
13) Which theoretical approach studies the variable meanings that people attach to everyday behavior, including
sexuality?
A) the structural-functional approach
B) the symbolic-interaction approach
C) queer theory
D) the social-conflict approach
14) Which of the following statements shows a strength of the symbolic-interaction approach regarding sexuality?
A) It explains that societies construct patterns of sexuality and highlights the variety of sexual practices found
around the world.
B) It contributes to the rising public concern about sexual harassment.
C) It helps us to understand why society must regulate with whom and when people reproduce.
D) It helps us understand men's power over women.
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15) The changing importance of virginity over the last century in our society is a topic most people would associate
with:
A) the symbolic-interaction approach.
B) the structural-functional approach.
C) the social-conflict approach.
D) queer theory.
16) The text suggests that probably the most hotly contested issue involving sexuality in the United States today is:
A) abortion.
B) homosexuality and gay rights.
C) teen pregnancy.
D) prostitution.
17) "Crime" differs from "deviance" in that crime:
A) involves a larger share of the population.
B) is a violation of norms enacted into law.
C) is always more serious.
D) is always less serious.
18) Every society tries to regulate the behavior of individuals with the goal of preventing deviance; this process is
called:
A) socialization.
B) the legal system.
C) neighborhood watch.
D) social control.
19) Which of the following comes closest to the correct view of the role of biology in causing people to commit
crimes?
A) Males with certain body types commit most serious crimes.
B) Biological factors may have a real but small effect in causing some people to commit crimes.
C) Lombroso proved a century ago that biological factors are a major cause of crime.
D) Genetics research has succeeded in explaining most criminality.
20) Emile Durkheim's basic insight is that deviance is:
A) defined by the rich and used against the poor.
B) a dysfunctional element of social organization.
C) a normal element of social organization.
D) less common in modern societies.
21) Here are four assertions about the social foundation of deviance; select the one that is FALSE.
A) Most acts that are deviant in one place are deviant everywhere.
B) Norms and the way people define situations involve social power.
C) People become deviant as others define them that way.
D) Deviance exists only in relation to cultural norms.
22) In Robert Merton's strain theory, the term ________ correctly describes a person who gets rich by defrauding a
bank.
A) rebellion
B) innovation
C) ritualism
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D) retreatism
23) The basic idea behind labeling theory is that:
A) power has much to do with how a society defines deviance.
B) deviance arises not so much from what people do as how others respond to what they do.
C) deviance is actually useful in a number of ways.
D) All of the above are correct.
24) His friends begin to criticize this individual as a "boozer," pushing him out of their social circle. The individual
begins to drink even more, becomes bitter, and joins a new group of friends who are all heavy drinkers.
According to Edwin Lemert, this situation illustrates:
A) the onset of retreatism.
B) the onset of primary deviance.
C) the formation of a deviant subculture.
D) the onset of secondary deviance.
25) Edwin Sutherland's differential association theory links deviance to:
A) how others respond to the behavior in question.
B) how able a person is to contain deviant impulses.
C) the amount of contact a person has with others who encourage or discourage the behavior in question.
D) how others respond to the race, ethnicity, gender, and class or the individual.
26) Using a Marxist approach, Steven Spitzer claims that prime targets for deviant labeling include:
A) people who don't want to work for a living.
B) radicals who call for basic change in society itself.
C) people who threaten to take the property of others.
D) All of the above are correct.
27) ________ refers to the illegal actions of a corporation or people acting on its behalf.
A) Embezzlement
B) Capitalist crime
C) Corporate crime
D) Organized crime
28) Gender figures into the study of deviance because:
A) every society in the world applies more stringent normative controls to females than to males.
B) women account for most arrests for serious crimes in the United States.
C) most researchers in this area are women.
D) All of the above are correct.
29) In legal terms, a crime is composed of which two components?
A) a criminal and a victim
B) the act and criminal intent
C) the act and the social harm
D) the law and the violation
30) "Crimes against persons" includes ALL BUT WHICH of the following?
A) forcible rape
B) murder
C) burglary
D) aggravated assault
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31) Victimization surveys show that the actual amount of crime in the United States is about ________ what official
reports indicate.
A) half of
B) the same as
C) three times greater than
D) ten times greater than
32) Most people arrested for a violent crime are:
A) people of mixed race.
B) African American.
C) of Hispanic or Asian ancestry.
D) white.
33) The oldest justification for punishing an offender is:
A) social protection.
B) rehabilitation.
C) retribution.
D) deterrence.
34) Because of social stratification:
A) working hard is the only way people can become wealthy.
B) what people get out of life is pretty much what they put into it.
C) some people have more privileges and opportunities than others do.
D) all people begin life on a level playing field.
35) One of the following statements is NOT true. Which is it?
A) Social stratification is a matter of beliefs about how and why people should be unequal.
B) One family's social standing typically changes a great deal from generation to generation.
C) Social stratification is a trait of society.
D) Social stratification is universal and also variable.
36) A caste system is defined as:
A) social stratification based on ascription or birth.
B) a meritocracy.
C) social stratification based on individual achievement.
D) any social system in which categories of people are unequal.
37) Caste systems:
A) assign people to certain types of work.
B) discourage social contact between people of different castes.
C) require that people marry within their own category.
D) All of the above are correct.
38) The term "meritocracy" refers to social stratification:
A) based entirely on personal merit.
B) with no social mobility.
C) as found in the United States.
D) in which people "know their place."
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39) Typically, the degree of status consistency is:
A) the same in all types of social stratification.
B) greater the more productive a society is.
C) greater in class than caste systems.
D) greater in caste than class systems.
40) Structural social mobility refers to:
A) cultural beliefs that justify social stratification.
B) change in social position due to people's own efforts.
C) change in a family's social position from one generation to the next.
D) change in social position of many people due to changes in society itself.
41) The common ideology of a class system treats ________ as a sign of personal talent and effort and poverty as a
result of ________.
A) family name; forces outside one's control.
B) merit; flaws in society
C) wealth; personal inadequacy
D) charity; bad fortune
42) According to the Davis-Moore thesis:
A) equality is functional for society.
B) meritocracy is less productive than a caste system.
C) more important jobs must yield enough rewards to attract the talent necessary to perform them well.
D) the more inequality a society has, the more productive it is.
43) According to Davis and Moore, inequality promotes productivity:
A) by encouraging people to perform more important jobs.
B) by encouraging people to get the schooling and skills needed to perform more important jobs.
C) by motivating people to work longer, harder, or better.
D) All of the above are correct.
44) In Karl Marx's analysis, another name for the capitalist class is the:
A) proletariat.
B) nobility.
C) aristocracy.
D) bourgeoisie.
45) While the Davis and Moore thesis suggests "to each according to the importance of one's work," Karl Marx
supported the idea:
A) "each gets, in the end, what is deserved."
B) "to each the same, from each the same."
C) "from each according to his ability, to each according to need."
D) "to each according to his ability, from each according to his talent."
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46) Which of the following is NOT one of the reasons that a social revolution did not take place as Karl Marx
predicted?
A) There is no longer any concentration of wealth.
B) Living standards have risen.
C) The law affords workers far more legal protections.
D) Stock places ownership of companies in the hands of tens of millions of people.
47) Max Weber considered an individual's social position to be:
A) a matter of power.
B) a matter of social status or prestige.
C) a matter of economic class.
D) All of the above are correct.
48) Max Weber argued that, in agrarian societies, which dimension of social inequality had greatest importance?
A) power
B) social prestige or honor
C) control of information
D) economic class
49) The lowest-ranking 40 percent of U.S. families has about:
A) 30 percent of all privately held wealth.
B) 20 percent of all privately held wealth.
C) 10 percent of all privately held wealth.
D) no wealth at all.
50) About ________ of the richest people in the United States gained their fortunes mostly from inheritance.
A) one-eighth
B) one-fourth
C) one-half
D) two-thirds
51) Compared to the upper class, the middle class in the United States contains:
A) far more racial and ethnic diversity.
B) far more women.
C) more single people and many fewer families.
D) people with greater personal wealth.
52) In general, people of low class position:
A) are less likely to describe their own health as "excellent."
B) live fewer years overall.
C) live in less safe and more stressful environments.
D) All of the above are correct.
53) Which of the following terms refers to upward or downward social mobility of children in relation to their
parents?
A) intragenerational social mobility
B) horizontal social mobility
C) structural social mobility
D) intergenerational social mobility
54) Relative poverty is:
A) not an issue in the United States.
B) life threatening.
C) found everywhere.
D) All of the above are correct.
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55) In terms of absolute numbers, two-thirds of all poor people in the United States are:
A) white.
B) African American.
C) Hispanic.
D) Asian American.
56) The "feminization of poverty" refers to the fact that, in the United States:
A) a larger share of the poor are women.
B) more and more women are becoming poor.
C) women have fewer and fewer rights.
D) fewer women are working for income.
57) In which of the following regions is the poverty rate highest?
A) rural areas
B) suburbs
C) central cities
D) All of these areas have the same poverty rate.
58) The poorest 20 percent of the global population receives only about ________ percent of all global income.
A) 1
B) 5
C) 10
D) 15
59) High-income nations:
A) are evenly spread throughout all world regions.
B) are all within North America.
C) contain a majority of the world's people.
D) lie mostly in the Northern Hemisphere.
60) High-income nations:
A) contain almost all the world's financial markets.
B) make use of large factories and advanced energy sources.
C) are at the forefront of the Information Revolution.
D) All of the above are correct.
61) The settlements called "Las Colonias," which are communities containing many extremely poor people, are
found:
A) throughout the United States.
B) in the Los Angeles inner-city.
C) in south Florida.
D) along the Mexican border of Texas.
62) In low-income nations, poverty is ________ than in the United States.
A) more widespread and severe
B) less serious a problem
C) addressed more effectively
D) more likely to involve men
63) Roughly half of all the world's street children are found in:
A) Africa.
B) Europe.
C) Asia.
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D) Latin America.
64) In poor countries, the disadvantages women face relative to men are:
A) about the same as in rich nations.
B) greater than in rich nations.
C) smaller than in rich nations.
D) In poor countries, women have higher social standing than men.
65) Which type of slavery refers to one person owning another?
A) debt bondage
B) child slavery
C) servile forms of marriage
D) chattel slavery
66) Modernization theory claims that:
A) most poor nations were richer in the past.
B) the main causes of poverty involve culture and technology.
C) poor nations can never become rich in today's world.
D) the main causes of poverty involve multinational corporations.
67) Dependency theory differs from modernization theory by:
A) explaining global inequality in terms of the exploitation of poor countries by rich countries.
B) supporting capitalism as a path to development.
C) making poor nations responsible for their own fate.
D) claiming that economic development is not a desirable goal.
68) While modernization theory focuses on ________, dependency theory focuses on ________.
A) the production of wealth; the distribution of wealth
B) the future; the past
C) rich nations; poor nations
D) All of the above are correct.
69) With regard to the role of rich nations, dependency theory:
A) agrees with modernization theory.
B) urges rich nations to invest in poor countries.
C) claims that rich nations prevent poor countries from "growing for export."
D) claims that rich nations are to blame for global poverty.
70) Over the course of the last century, the extent of global inequality has:
A) increased.
B) decreased sharply.
C) become smaller, but not by much.
D) stayed about the same.
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