Research Methods in Sociology
Midterm Exam
Course Introduction
Research Methods in Sociology introduces students to the fundamental principles and practices involved in conducting sociological research. The course covers both qualitative and quantitative methodologies, including survey design, interviews, observation, content analysis, and experiments. Students learn how to formulate research questions, design studies, collect and analyze data, interpret findings, and present sociological evidence. Emphasis is placed on ethical considerations, reliability, validity, and the role of theory in research. By the end of the course, students develop the critical skills necessary to evaluate, design, and conduct independent sociological research projects.
Recommended Textbook
The Essentials of Statistics A Tool for Social Research 2nd Edition by Joseph F. Healey
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2
Chapter 1: Introduction
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Sample Questions
Q1) A public opinion poll that gauges the popularity of the President of the United States is an example of
A)descriptive statistics.
B)inferential statistics.
C)analytical statistics.
D)reductionist statistics.
Answer: B
Q2) Which of the following can be treated as an interval-ratio variable?
A)social security number
B)zip code
C)age
D)hair color
Answer: C
Q3) Addition and subtraction are completely justified only when variables are A)dependent.
B)nominal.
C)ordinal.
D)interval-ratio.
Answer: D
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Page 3
Chapter 2: Basic Descriptive Statistics: Percentages Ratios
and Rates Frequency Distributions
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Q1) \(\begin{array}{|l|l|l|}
\hline \text {TABLE 2.1 POLITICAL PARTY } \\
\text {MEMBERSHIP IN TWO } \\
\text { COMMUNITIES } \\
\hline \text { PARTY: } & \text { COMMUNITYA } & \text { COMMUUNITY B } \\
\hline \text { Republican } & 103 & 17 \\
\hline \text { Democrat } & 135 & 21 \\
\hline \text { Independent } & 17 & 15 \\
\hline \text { Socialist } & 9 & 11 \\
\hline \text { TOTALS: } & 264 & 154 \\
\hline
\end{array}\)
In Table 2.1,what percentage of Democrats lives in community B?
A)(21 / 64)´ 100 = 32.8
B)(21/328)´ 100 = 6.4
C)(21/156)´ 100 = 13.5
D)(64/264)´ 100 = 24.2
Answer: C
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Page 4
Chapter 3: Charts and Graphs
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Sample Questions
Q1) In a line chart,if the line over a particular score is close to or touches the horizontal axis,the score is
A)rare or uncommon.
B)very common.
C)low.
D)out of range of the other scores.
Answer: A
Q2) In a histogram,as opposed to a bar chart,the bars
A)are separated by at least one unit.
B)touch each other.
C)are arranged from most common to least common.
D)are useful only for ordinal level variables.
Answer: B
Q3) A graph of the distribution of income for U.S.households presented in the text shows that
A)most households earn between $25,000 and $35,000.
B)the rich are getting richer.
C)there is a clustering of households in the $50,000 - $100,000 range.
D)half of American households earn more than $100,000.
Answer: C
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Chapter 4: Measures of Central Tendency
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Q1) In a small seminar class,there were eight Protestants,four Catholics,three Jews,two Muslims,a Buddhist,and eight students with no religious affiliation ("Nones").The mode for this variable is A)eight.
B)undefined since the variable is nominal in level of measurement.
C)Protestant and "None."
D)the same as the median.
Q2) It is possible for a variable to have A)one mode.
B)many modes.
C)no mode.
D)all of these
Q3) The three commonly used measures of central tendency are A)mode,median,and mean.
B)percentage,midpoint,and mean.
C)mode,midpoint,and ratio.
D)median,rate,and mode.
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6
Chapter 5: Measures of Dispersion
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Sample Questions
Q1) The information below compares the final exam grades for 2 biology classes: \(\begin{array}{|l|l|}
\hline \text { Class } 1&\text { Class } 2\\ \hline\\
\hline \bar { X }&\bar { X }\\ =80.2 & =81.3 \\
\hline s=12.1 & s=6.7 \\
\hline N=25 & N=23 \\ \hline \end{array}\)
What may we conclude? Class 1
A)is more homogeneous.
B)is more heterogeneous.
C)was a better class.
D)had no grade higher than a 90.
Q2) The greater the skew of a distribution of scores,
A)the lower the value of the standard deviation.
B)the higher the value of the standard deviation.
C)the lower the value of the range.
D)none of these.Measures of dispersion are not affected by skew.
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Page 7
Chapter 6: The Normal Curve
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Sample Questions
Q1) The Z scores of two test scores are -1.17 and +2.38.To find the total area beyond these two scores,
A)add the column b areas together.
B)subtract each score from the mean and divide the result by the standard deviation.
C)add the column b area to the column c area.
D)add the column c areas.
Q2) The area between a negative Z score and a positive Z score can be found by
A)subtracting the Z scores from each other.
B)subtracting each Z score from the mean and adding the results.
C)adding the Z scores and finding the area in the Z score table for the summed Z scores.
D)adding the areas between each Z score and the mean.
Q3) Assuming a normal distribution of 1000 cases,how many cases will be farther away from the mean than +3 standard deviations?
A)at least 500
B)about 3
C)327
D)It's impossible to estimate.
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Chapter 7: Introduction in Inferential Statistics, the
Sampling Distribution, and Estimation
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Sample Questions
Q1) For each situation below,construct the 95% confidence interval estimate to the population.Assume that the results are based on a nationally representative sample.Express the estimate in a sentence.
a.The average age of the 1225 respondents was 25.3 with a standard deviation of 1.9.
b.Of the 998 respondents questioned, 246 identified themselves as Catholic.
c.Of the 1220 respondents for whom we have information, 178 said that they had been divorced at least once.
d.Four hundred and thirty two of the 668 respondents questioned said that they favored capital punishment for people convicted of murder. Ten years ago, in response to the same question, 378 out of 703 people were in favor of capital punishment. Has support for capital punishment risen over the ten year period?
e.The average number of children for the 945 respondents for which we have information was 1.98 with a standard deviation of 1.04.
f.The average years of school completed for 734 respondents was 11.9 with a standard deviation of 0.5.
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Page 9
Chapter 8: Hypothesis Testing I: the One-Sample Case
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Sample Questions
Q1) Under what condition might we use proportions rather than means as the test statistic?
A)when sample size is very small
B)when sample size is very large
C)when the variable of interest is only interval-ratio in level of measurement
D)when the variable of interest is only nominal in level of measurement
Q2) In tests of significance,if the test statistic falls in the critical region,we may conclude that
A)the population distribution is normal.
B)the null hypothesis can be rejected.
C)the research hypothesis is true.
D)our sample size was too small.
Q3) The t distribution,compared to the Z distribution,is
A)more skewed.
B)more peaked for small samples but increasingly like the Z distribution as N increases.
C)bimodal.
D)flatter for small sample sizes but increasingly like the Z distribution as N increases.
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Chapter 9: Hypothesis Testing II: the Two-Sample Case
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Q1) In the two sample case,the null hypothesis is always about the difference in the A)populations.
B)samples.
C)standard errors.
D)all of these
Q2) When testing for the significance of the difference between two sample means,we must first estimate ____ before we can compute the test statistic.
A)the standard deviation of the sampling distribution
B)the standard deviations of the samples
C)the population means
D)the critical region
Q3) When conducting hypothesis tests for two sample means,the term m<sub>1</sub>m<sub>2</sub> in the numerator of the formula reduces to zero because
A)the standard deviations are calculated first.
B)the tests are conducted at very low alpha levels.
C)the samples are independent as well as random.
D)the null hypothesis is assumed to be true.
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Chapter 10: Hypothesis Testing III: the Analysis of Variance
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Sample Questions
Q1) For ANOVA,we construct two estimates of the population variance.These are called
A)the average estimates.
B)the standard estimates.
C)the within and total estimates.
D)the mean square estimates.
Q2) In the ANOVA test,degrees of freedom within (dfw)are equal to (N - k)and degrees of freedom between (dfb)are equal to ____.
A)(N - k)
B)(k - 1)
C)(N + k)
D)(k - N)
Q3) When we have an interval-ratio dependent variable and are comparing two groups,the appropriate test of significance is the ____.When we have an interval-ratio dependent variable and are comparing three or more groups,the appropriate test of significance is the ____.
A)t test;ANOVA
B)ANOVA;t test
C)chi square;ANOVA
D)t test;chi square
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Page 12
Chapter 11: Hypothesis Testing Iv: Chi Square
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Q1) If the row and column marginals of the expected frequencies are not equal to those of the observed frequencies
A)an arithmetic error has occurred.
B)Yate's correction must be applied.
C)the null hypothesis must be rejected.
D)switch to the ANOVA test.
Q2) An obtained chi square of 10.78 has been calculated.Critical Chi square is 3.841.What should be concluded?
A)nothing¾information is incomplete
B)reject the null hypothesis,the variables are not independent
C)reject the null hypothesis,the variables are independent
D)fail to reject the null hypothesis
Q3) The sampling distribution for chi squares is
A)shaped like any other normal curve.
B)not normally distributed.
C)bimodal.
D)all of these
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Chapter 12: Introduction to Bivariate Association and
Measures of Association for Variables Measured at the
Nominal Level
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Q1) A researcher has found a strong relationship between level of education and income and concludes that "higher levels of education cause higher income." What error has been made?
A)None,the argument is sound.
B)Income is only nominal in level of measurement and education is ordinal so they cannot be causally related.
C)Since these variables are continuous and interval ratio,they cannot have a causal relationship.
D)By itself,association does not prove causation.
Q2) A researcher finds that males are much more supportive of cohabitation than females.The phi is 0.25.This is a ____ relationship.
A)moderate
B)negative
C)positive
D)strong
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Page 14
Chapter 13: Association Between Variables Measured at the
Ordinal Level
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Q1) Gamma is an appropriate measure of association for A)examining the relationships between more than two ordinal-level variables.
B)nominal-level variables with more than 3 scores.
C)ordinal level variables arranged in a bivariate table.
D)ordinal level variables with many scores.
Q2) Gamma will be zero if
A)the variables are strongly related.
B)the relationship is negative.
C)knowledge of the independent variable does not improve our ability to predict the dependent variable.
D)the scores of each case are symmetrical to the scores of all other cases.
Q3) For a relationship involving education and library use,gamma was +0.37.This relationship is
A)weak and positive.
B)strong and negative.
C)moderate and positive.
D)positive and weak.
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Page 15
Chapter 14: Association Between Variables Measured at the
Interval-Ratio Level
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Q1) If the regression line on a scattergram slopes upward from left to right,the relationship is
A)bivariate.
B)strong.
C)parallel.
D)positive.
Q2) When referring to interval-ratio variables,a commonly used synonym for association is
A)probability.
B)predictability.
C)correlation.
D)causation.
Q3) By convention,the independent variable is arrayed along the ____ in a scattergram.
A)vertical axis (the ordinate)
B)regression line
C)horizontal axis (the abscissa)
D)calibration line
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Page 16
Chapter 15: Partial Correlation and Multiple Regression and Correlation
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Q1) To the extent that the variables do not meet the assumptions of regression analysis,coefficients and slopes become
A)greater in value.
B)lower in value.
C)less trustworthy.
D)less representative of the population.
Q2) While unstandardized partial slopes permit predictions of Y in the original units of the variable,standardized partial slopes permit an assessment of
A)the combined effects of the independents.
B)the partial effects of the independents.
C)the independent effects of the partials.
D)the relative importance of the independents.
Q3) When examining a bivariate relationship using Pearson's r,the partial correlation computed while using one control variable is called
A)the first-order partial correlation coefficient.
B)the second-order partial correlation coefficient.
C)the intervening partial correlation coefficient.
D)the multiple partial correlation coefficient.
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