Contemporary Social Issues
Exam Solutions
Course Introduction
This course explores significant social issues affecting modern societies, focusing on topics such as inequality, discrimination, migration, environmental challenges, gender dynamics, and media influence. Students critically examine the root causes and consequences of these issues, analyze different perspectives and policy responses, and consider the roles individuals and institutions play in shaping social change. Through case studies, discussions, and research, the course fosters analytical thinking and equips students with the tools necessary to engage with and address contemporary social challenges.
Recommended Textbook
You May Ask Yourself An Introduction to Thinking Like a Sociologist Core 4th Edition by Dalton Conley
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Page 2
Chapter 1: The Sociological Imagination: An Introduction
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Q1) The intended purpose of desegregation of schools in the 1950s was to make education equal for everyone.What was not intended was that many racial minority teachers and principals lost their jobs.This unintended purpose was called a(n)____________ function by functionalist theorist Talcott Parsons.
A) unintended
B) manifest
C) mistaken
D) latent
Answer: D
Q2) Feeling discomfort about rural Chinese society,where many generations of a family sleep in the same bed,is known as:
A) xenophobia.
B) Verstehen.
C) social engineering.
D) social ecology.
Answer: A
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Chapter 2: Methods
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Q1) Because they are an accessible population,sociologists sometimes use undergraduate students in their research.In relation to the concept of generalizability in science,this tendency could represent a potential defect in research because:
A) college undergraduates do not have the right to refuse without suffering negative consequences.
B) the experiences of college undergraduates do not provide a legitimate empirical resource.
C) college undergraduates are not a subset of the general population.
D) college undergraduates are not typical of the public at large.
Answer: D
Q2) If Juanita practices ____________ in her research,she carefully considers how her role as researcher may affect those whom she studies (the researched).
A) reflexivity
B) selective attention
C) empathy
D) common sense
Answer: A
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Chapter 3: Culture and Media
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Q1) The experience of internalizing a culture's norms,values,and the like,is known as:
A) socialization.
B) ideology.
C) hegemony.
D) reflection.
Answer: A
Q2) According to ____________,the language we speak directly influences and reflects the way we think about and see the world.
A) the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis
B) the high-low culture debate
C) Marxist ideology
D) the law of averages
Answer: A
Q3) An example of nonmaterial culture is:
A) money.
B) books.
C) values.
D) cars.
Answer: C
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Page 5
Chapter 4: Socialization and the Construction of Reality
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Q1) What does Cooley mean by his looking glass self theory? How does this theory explain the development of our self-concept?
Q2) If your professor asked you to do a breaching experiment,you might do which of the following?
A) ask a stranger for the time
B) ask a stranger to tie your shoes
C) tell your parents you are going over to a friend's house to study D) tell your best friend that there is something in his or her teeth
Q3) A recognizable social position that an individual occupies,such as student or professor,is known as a:
A) status.
B) role.
C) face.
D) total institution.
Q4) Sociologists view socialization as a lifelong process that begins when a child: A) can distinguish the I from me. B) is born.
C) is still in the womb.
D) internalizes the norms and values of society.
Q5) List and give an example of each of the four main agents of socialization.
Page 6
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Chapter 5: Groups and Networks
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Q1) If stepsiblings are asked to share bedrooms or other possessions,and one of them views such sharing as an intrusion,he or she may have difficulty overcoming the tendency to play the role of ____________ between his or her parent and the new stepmother or stepfather.
A) tertius gaudens
B) divide et impera
C) mediator
D) arbitrator
Q2) What trend,related to a decline in social capital,did Robert Putnam focus on in his book Bowling Alone?
A) the decline in donations to charitable organizations in the United States
B) the decline in beer drinking among "lone" bowlers
C) the declining interest in global capital investments
D) the declining interest in community-based activities and organizations
Q3) A friendship group isn't an example of a formal organization because:
A) friends don't tend to engage in collective activities.
B) friends include strong ties, not weak ties.
C) friends typically don't have formal rules and governing structures.
D) even if one person leaves the group, they will still go on.
Q4) Define in-groups and out-groups,and give one example of each.
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Chapter 6: Social Control and Deviance
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Q1) Devah Pager (2001)found,in her study of job applications and criminal records,that a negative social label affects people's chances in life.This label is called a ____________ by sociologists.
A) crime
B) bias
C) stigma
D) primary deviance
Q2) A drug dealer stops selling drugs after learning on the street that another dealer was caught and punished.This is an example of which of the following?
A) specific deterrence
B) general deterrence
C) anomie
D) recidivism
Q3) Punishments that are based on the usually unexpressed but widely known rules of group membership are known as unspoken rules and as:
A) restitutive.
B) rehabilitative.
C) formal social sanctions.
D) informal social sanctions.
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Page 8
Chapter 7: Stratification
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Q1) What is the fastest-growing job market for people with only a high school education?
A) mechanical work
B) secretarial work
C) factory work
D) food preparation
Q2) Pareto believed in a society in which status and mobility are based on individual attributes and ability,called:
A) meritocracy.
B) intelligence.
C) morals.
D) biology.
Q3) Ferguson and Millar saw social developments resulting from the establishment of private property as representing a huge improvement in society because private property leads to higher degrees of social organization and: A) individuals.
B) efficiency.
C) incentives.
D) bureaucracy.
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Chapter 8: Gender
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Q1) Explain essentialism and biological determinism and the binary model in relation to sex and gender.
Q2) Bob and Sue paint their baby's room pink as soon as they find out they are having a girl.They are beginning to provide the baby with what?
A) self-awareness
B) a playroom
C) her race
D) her gendered identity
Q3) Anthropologist Don Kulick (1998)conducted an ethnography of the transgender prostitutes in Brazil,known as travesti.Which of the following did he find to be true?
A) The travesti display stereotypically feminine traits and identify themselves as women.
B) The travesti think of themselves as men who emulate women, but are not women.
C) The travesti think of themselves as male, even if they allow themselves to be penetrated by other men.
D) The travesti identify themselves simply as men and are identified by other Brazilians as "normal men."
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Chapter 9: Race
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Q1) The majority of the Latinos in the United States come from:
A) Puerto Rico.
B) Cuba.
C) Mexico.
D) the Dominican Republic.
Q2) During the mid-twentieth century in the United States,many blacks moved north to escape Jim Crow laws in the rural South.This resulted in:
A) an immediate improvement in the lives of African Americans.
B) movement of more whites to the South.
C) competition for housing and employment in the North, resulting in violent clashes between whites and blacks.
D) many blacks "passing" as white.
Q3) Race is not a fixed biological or natural reality; rather,it is:
A) genetic.
B) biologically invented.
C) an environmental reality.
D) a social construction.
Q4) What was the premise behind eugenics? How did eugenics explain race? What is the problem with this explanation? Give examples.
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Chapter 10: Poverty
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Q1) The stress that poor parents experience manifests itself in:
A) lower IQs among children.
B) more punitive parenting behaviors.
C) more of the children's time spent in day care and with babysitters.
D) poor parents providing cheaper educational environments for their children.
Q2) What was the problem with the Gautreaux Assisted Housing Program?
A) There weren't enough houses for all the families.
B) It produced no improvement or changes.
C) Families brought destructive behaviors from the ghetto to the new neighborhood.
D) Participants were self-selected.
Q3) According to the underclass thesis,the poor are:
A) undependable.
B) no different from the rest of us.
C) deviant and dangerous to mainstream society.
D) unmotivated and lazy.
Q4) Discuss the no effect paradigm and suggest how Marlin and his brother could have had a better life using this theory.
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Chapter 11: Health and Society
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Q1) The "drift explanation" of the relationship between health and socioeconomic status (SES)states that:
A) people with more money are able to select better foods and are therefore healthier than those with less money.
B) genetics and biology affect SES so that people who are healthier have an easier time maintaining a high SES.
C) there is no relationship between health and (SES); any observed relationship is the result of selection bias by researchers.
D) people with better health select higher-paying jobs than those with poor health.
Q2) The American values of hard work and self-reliance might lead blacks to follow the example of which folklore figure in order to prove themselves?
A) David Satcher
B) Paul Bunyan
C) Davy Crockett
D) John Henry
Q3) Explain in detail the Whitehall Study.What is the significance of this study? What are the criticisms of this study?
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Chapter 12: Family (in Core edition)
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Q1) Structural changes brought on by industrialization in the United States meant that families changed from "grapevine" forms to:
A) "roots."
B) "petals."
C) "beanpoles."
D) "weeds."
Q2) According to data in Chapter 12,U.S.women earn about how much for every dollar earned by U.S.men?
A) $0.77
B) $0.81
C) $0.91
D) $0.98
Q3) Family life during the preindustrial period differed quite a bit from family life during the Industrial Revolution.Discuss some of these differences.
Q4) Define what Hochschild and others call the supermom strategy,and discuss one possible negative consequence.
Q5) Discuss three specific reasons why housework is overlooked as a worthy or meaningful activity in the United States.
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Chapter 13: Education
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Q1) If affirmative action programs were eliminated,which group would most likely see an increase in chances of admission to elite colleges and universities?
A) black students
B) female students
C) Hispanic students
D) Asian students
Q2) With regard to race and college degree completion,which of the following is correct?
A) In 2010, about 86 percent of blacks age 25 and older had graduated from college, as opposed to about 28 percent of whites in the same age range.
B) In 2010, about 81 percent of blacks age 25 and older had graduated from college, as opposed to about 86 percent of whites in the same age range.
C) In 2010, about 20 percent of blacks age 25 and older had graduated from college, as opposed to about 30 percent of whites in the same age range.
D) In 2007, about 28 percent of blacks age 25 and older had graduated from college, as opposed to about 18 percent of whites in the same age range.
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Chapter 14: Capitalism and the Economy
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Q1) According to Adam Smith,the most efficient way to produce something is:
A) with the use of skilled craftsmen who control the entire production process.
B) with a mechanical assembly line that carries the product to the workers.
C) through the use of interchangeable parts.
D) through a division of labor that breaks production into its constituent parts.
Q2) What effect did the agricultural revolution in Europe have on the transition to capitalism?
A) It slowed down the development of capitalism.
B) It helped capitalism develop.
C) It occurred thousands of years before capitalism and was unrelated.
D) It kept the capitalist economies of some countries underdeveloped.
Q3) Georg Simmel saw the development of monetary payment systems as part of a historical evolution leading to:
A) depersonalization of exchange.
B) treating humans like animals.
C) a communistic society.
D) bringing the working class and elites together.
Q4) Corporations have what is called limited liability.What does this mean?
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Page 16
Chapter 15: Authority and the State
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Q1) In 1961,Stanley Milgram devised an experiment to measure:
A) people's individual biological characteristics.
B) how far ordinary people would go in obeying an authority figure.
C) intelligence.
D) social acceptance of people from different races.
Q2) Your deference to your parents and professors and to the laws of the U.S.government is best seen as an example of domination by:
A) authority.
B) power.
C) government.
D) economic power.
Q3) When a company dominates because it has a monopoly on the industry,this is called domination by: A) authority.
B) power.
C) government.
D) economic power.
Q4) Steven Lukes uses a three-dimensional model to elaborate on Weber's definition of power.Describe and explain Lukes's three dimensions.
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Chapter 16: Religion
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Q1) To understand the role of religion in people's lives and how individuals value and experience their faiths,which type of sociological approach should we adopt?
A) microsociology
B) mesosociology
C) macrosociology
D) all of the above
Q2) A ____________ is a group of people who get together for worship.
A) denomination
B) religion
C) church
D) congregation
Q3) According to Weber,which religion was a necessary condition for the development of capitalism?
A) Jainism
B) Protestant Christianity
C) Hinduism
D) Judaism
Q4) What is the sect-church cycle? How can this help us understand social change?
Q5) What are some criticisms of Karl Marx's view of religion?
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Chapter 17: Science, the Environment, and Society
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Q1) Sometimes meat and poultry aren't labeled organic even though they come from free-range animals raised without growth hormones or antibiotics.This is because:
A) small farmers are moving into cities and leaving their organic farms behind.
B) the guidelines as to what is an organic farm have not yet been established by the government.
C) maintaining an organic farm with U.S. Department of Agriculture certification is expensive; many farmers can't comply because of this.
D) it is difficult to keep cattle and chickens fenced in; therefore, they could be contaminated by other animals.
Q2) Sociologists of science are interested in the ____________ of scientific discoveries.
A) gender relationships
B) environmental effects
C) social consequences
D) biological background
Q3) Describe the intersection between science and politics.How do they influence each other?
Q4) Discuss the effects of global warming from a sociological perspective.
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19
Chapter 18: Collective Action, Social Movements, and Social Change
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Q1) Value-added theory was "borrowed" from the discipline of:
A) sociology.
B) economics.
C) history.
D) psychology.
Q2) A homeless shelter for battered women,where they can learn how to care for themselves and their children,would be an example of a(n)____________ social movement.
A) reformative
B) redemptive
C) alterative
D) revolutionary
Q3) The emergence of a social movement that is a collective response to structural strain that has a psychological effect on individuals is explained by:
A) the political process model.
B) revolutionary theory.
C) classical theory.
D) resource mobilization theory.
Q4) What is a social movement? Describe the four types of social movements and give examples.
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