Sociology for Non-Majors Exam Review
Course
Introduction
Sociology for Non-Majors introduces students to the fundamental concepts, theories, and methods of sociology, emphasizing how social forces shape individual and group behavior. Through an exploration of topics such as culture, socialization, race, gender, class, institutions, and social change, the course encourages students to critically assess the structures and patterns that influence daily life. Designed for students from diverse academic backgrounds, the course fosters a deeper understanding of societal dynamics and equips learners with the analytical tools to recognize and evaluate the impact of social issues in contemporary society.
Recommended Textbook
The Sociology Project Introducing the Sociological Imagination 1st Edition by Jeff Manza
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21 Chapters
2624 Verified Questions
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Chapter 1: The Sociological Imagination
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Sample Questions
Q1) Sociologists' explanations of how the external world shapes behaviors and social outcomes are narrower than those of other disciplines.
A)True
B)False
Answer: False
Q2) Why were lines between social sciences unclear when they first developed?
A)The backgrounds of early social scientists were diverse,and they often conducted work in multiple disciplines.
B)Early social scientists,who were educated as physicians,were reluctant to leave their medical school posts.
C)Early universities were unwilling to fund the social sciences,forcing them to share resources.
D)High degrees of social cohesion among social scientists made them reluctant to split apart.
Answer: A
Q3) Interdisciplinary research is next to impossible for sociologists to conduct.
A)True
B)False
Answer: False
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Page 3
Chapter 2: Studying the Social World
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Sample Questions
Q1) You want to study a riot that occurred over 60 years ago.You have access to a handful of survivors,but they likely cannot provide all the information you need.Which two research methods should you use to complete the study?
A)ethnography and interviews
B)interviews and historical research
C)surveys and ethnography
D)interviews and experiments
Answer: B
Q2) Cross-sectional data is collected __________.
A)at one point in time
B)over a period of a few weeks
C)over a period of several months
D)at two points in time several decades apart
Answer: A
Q3) Data displays are __________ patterns in data.
A)coded examples of
B)numerical references to C)visual images of
D)pull-down menus that access
Answer: C
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Chapter 3: Social Interaction
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Sample Questions
Q1) Sociologists use the term civil inattention to refer to the way in which strangers ignore each other to an appropriate degree when their paths cross in public spaces (e.g. ,in theaters).
A)True
B)False Answer: True
Q2) What makes people competent members of society is not so much knowing all the rules but knowing what to do on particular occasions given what is expected of us.
A)True
B)False
Answer: True
Q3) In terms of social science,what is socialization?
A)the process through which private businesses are taken over by the state
B)the process through which we meet new people and make friends
C)the process by which we come to understand the expectations,rules,and norms of the society in which we live
D)the process through which we come to understand ourselves and develop a sense of self
Answer: C
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Page 5
Chapter 4: Social Structure
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Sample Questions
Q1) What was the leading reason for immigration to the United States from the 1880s to the 1920s?
A)jobs in agriculture
B)jobs in manufacturing
C)escape from religious persecutions
D)escape from political persecutions
Q2) Which of the following barriers to equal opportunity is legal in the United States?
A)restrictions on women in managerial roles
B)restrictions on women in combat roles
C)restrictions on college admission based on race
D)restrictions on college admission based on income
Q3) Rosa is from a working-class family of six.She was able to get scholarships for college and earned a law degree.Rosa is now an attorney for a Fortune 500 firm and has a compensation package worth hundreds of thousands of dollars.Rosa's scenario best illustrates which sociological phenomenon?
A)privilege
B)the glass ceiling
C)intergenerational social mobility
D)critical mass
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Chapter 5: Culture, media, and Communication
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Q1) Jacinta's daughter has been preparing for a spelling bee by studying several hours a day and her son has been working on his science fair project.Jacinta feels that by encouraging this behavior,she is instilling a sense of competition in her children.Competition is an example of an American _________.
A)symbol
B)value
C)norm
D)habitus
Q2) What is the relationship between communication and culture?
Q3) The highest percentage of Americans who do not speak English at home lives in which state?
A)California
B)Florida
C)New York
D)Texas
Q4) One consequence of corporate media consolidation is that the media are less responsive to the local communities that they serve.
A)True
B)False
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Chapter 6: Power and Politics
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Sample Questions
Q1) Discuss the impact that poverty has on children and explain why poverty is a generational problem.
Q2) Discuss some of the ways in which the state regulates the economy and businesses.What is the purpose of these regulating policies?
Q3) Discuss the components of the three-dimensional view of power.
Q4) Which of these statements represents the powerlessness of B in relation to A,according to the three-dimensional view of power?
A)B comes to believe in A's ideas even when it is not in B's interest to do so.
B)B fails to get its challenge to A taken seriously
C)B is so frustrated by lack of power that B fails to issue a challenge to A.
D)B comes to believe that it is not in B's interest to win open conflicts.
Q5) Social Security,unemployment insurance,welfare for poor families,and many other such programs are collectively referred to as the welfare state.
A)True
B)False
Q6) Why have Americans been described as "conservative egalitarians"?
Q7) Discuss reasons why it is better to be a rich person in the United States than any other part of the world.
Page 8
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Chapter 7: Markets, organizations, and Work
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Sample Questions
Q1) __________ refers to how much a particular job allows workers to control their activity.
A)Autonomy
B)Security
C)Status
D)Trust
Q2) Monitoring work increases productivity,although it can also produce resistance.
A)True
B)False
Q3) What research supports the conclusion that the overall pattern of job growth over time seems to indicate that there has been a long-term shift towards jobs that require more skill and more education,not less?
Q4) Describe Max Weber's theory of bureaucracy.
Q5) What are the formal procedures and rules of a bureaucracy supposed to ensure?
A)accountability and efficiency
B)accountability and consistency
C)consistency and efficiency
D)efficiency and toleration
Q6) Discuss several characteristics of high-trust occupations.
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Q7) What is autonomy and why is it such an important component of job satisfaction?
Chapter 8: Cities and Communities
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Sample
Questions
Q1) Chicago School sociologist Ernest Burgess developed a model of urban community structure based on crime statistics.
A)True
B)False
Q2) Redlining is the practice of identifying the homes in racially homogenous white neighborhoods that carry the largest mortgages.
A)True
B)False
Q3) Explain how,even in the most distressed neighborhoods across the country,a strong sense of community can flourish.
Q4) With which of the following attributes of city life,more so than the others,did writer and activist Jane Jacobs concern herself?
A)the demographic composition of neighborhoods
B)the environmental hazards of neighborhoods
C)the cultural dynamics of neighborhoods
D)the physical layout of neighborhoods
Q5) What changes have led to neighborhoods with concentrated poverty in the United States?
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Chapter 9: Social Stratification, inequality, and Poverty
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Sample Questions
Q1) Among the working poor,even those who work at full-time jobs may not make enough to rise above the poverty line.
A)True
B)False
Q2) The premise of the __________ is that billionaires,millionaires,and all those at the top of the income ladder are expected to pay more in taxes than minimum-wage employees.
A)Gini Index
B)Lorenz curve
C)correlation coefficients
D)progressive tax system
Q3) Sociologists refer to societies in which individuals experience social mobility as
A)caste societies
B)closed societies
C)open societies
D)status-consistent societies
Q4) Why is socioeconomic status (SES)a useful tool in determining social class?
Q5) Discuss the criticisms of the talent justification.
Q6) What do sociologists mean by the term class?
Page 11
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Chapter 10: Race and Ethnicity
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Sample Questions
Q1) __________ have the highest rates of educational attainment in the United States.
A)African Americans
B)White Americans
C)Asian Americans
D)Native Americans
Q2) Nazi policies culminated in the __________ of millions of men,women,and children in a network of extermination camps during World War II.
A)genocide
B)segregation
C)expulsion
D)assimilation
Q3) Discuss how psychologists have explained racism and the shortcomings of these explanations.How do sociologists explain racism?
Q4) Are Halloween costumes that represent various racial and ethnic groups acceptable or harmful?
Q5) The ancient Greeks first created the color-coded hierarchy of race.
A)True
B)False
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Chapter 11: Gender and Sexuality
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Sample Questions
Q1) Of the following,which is the least plausible explanation for why women continue to earn less than men?
A)Women have fewer years of experience than men,who are much less likely to step away from paying positions to care for children.
B)Women in the workforce,by choice or because of discrimination,are concentrated in lower-paying jobs.
C)The Equal Pay Act of 1963 protects gaps in pay between men and women based on seniority and performance,but not on sex itself.
D)Employers set lower pay rates in jobs filled mostly by women than in different jobs filled mostly by men requiring the same level of education.
Q2) Evolutionary theories explain differences in sexual behavior in terms of
A)socialization
B)peer pressure
C)gender norms
D)genetics
Q3) Single people have sex more than married people.
Q4) Describe what is meant by the term gender pay gap.
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Chapter 12: Immigration
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Sample Questions
Q1) A __________ is a document authorizing a foreign-born person to enter a country,either permanently or temporarily.
A)migration contract
B)passport
C)transit application
D)visa
Q2) What kinds of factors should be taken into account when planning the future of U.S.immigration?
A)control and maintenance of our population growth
B)ease of understanding and of implementing immigration regulations
C)fear of undesirables,especially those who might harm the United States
D)high unemployment rates climbing even higher as immigrants take jobs away from native-born citizens
Q3) Why is a green card so coveted by foreign-born persons?
A)It is the paper evidence of asylum status.
B)It is the paper evidence of LPR status.
C)It is the paper evidence of refugee status.
D)It is the paper evidence of temporary legal status.
Q4) What is the significance of brain drain and why is it important to stem it?
Q5) Describe the two principal classes of legal permanent residents.
Page 14
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Chapter 13: Families and Family Life
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Sample Questions
Q1) A man with multiple marital partners is engaging in polygamy.
A)True
B)False
Q2) The rise of industrialization fostered the rise of a new family unit,the "conjugal family."
A)True
B)False
Q3) A 2007 Pew survey found that most Americans are accepting of unwed motherhood.
A)True
B)False
Q4) Provide specific examples of behavior that may indicate that a child's parents may have engaged in parenting that focuses on "natural growth."
Q5) Sociologist Joan Williams argues that workplace antidiscrimination policies need to address family responsibilities for what reason?
A)to end penalties that those who care for others face
B)to protect the rights of the childless
C)to institute the 35-hour workweek
D)to reaffirm family values
Q6) What do sociologists mean by fictive kin and what is an example of this?
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Chapter 14: Sociology of Religion
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Sample Questions
Q1) Which Christianity-related religious faith believes that the Trinity is unbiblical?
A)Copts
B)Eastern Orthodox Catholics
C)Jehovah's Witnesses
D)Mormons
Q2) Which of the following countries looks least like Europe in terms of its conventional religiosity?
A)Australia
B)Canada
C)Israel
D)the United States
Q3) Molly's sociology of religion class is discussing the following issues: the incompatibility of religion with modern life,the lessening of authority that religion has over people's lives,and the centering of people's lives around nonreligious factors.What concept is the class studying?
A)American exceptionalism
B)different sociological definitions of secularization
C)liberation theology
D)religious pluralism
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Page 16
Chapter 15: Education
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Sample Questions
Q1) Sociologists offer two competing explanations as to why people with more education reap larger socioeconomic rewards.What are they?
A)allocation theory and labeling theory
B)allocation theory and classical economic theory
C)socialization theory and allocation theory
D)socialization theory and human capital theory
Q2) Why does tracking persist,even though it clearly segregates students by social class and ethnicity?
A)Privileged parents feel that tracking gives their children educational benefits.
B)Tracking by ability group increases teachers' perceptions of what grades are appropriate for students in different tracks.
C)Movement toward detracking has never gained much support.
D)Many teachers prefer to manage classrooms with a range of student abilities.
Q3) Why does the tendency of more educated workers to marry later in life add to the divorce divide that has opened up between those with and without college degrees?
Q4) What is the relationship between social inequality and test scores on international educational achievement tests?
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Chapter 16: Crime, deviance, and Social Control
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Sample Questions
Q1) Which of the following is NOT commonly understood to be an institution of social control?
A)criminal courts
B)police departments
C)the workplace
D)schools
Q2) The "eye for an eye" principle was first established in the Jewish Talmud.
A)True
B)False
Q3) What is the difference between statistical deviance and social deviance?
Q4) Social scientists have identified three trends that indicated why Americans want increasing numbers of people incarcerated.Which of the following is NOT one of them identified by the author of this chapter?
A)urban riots in the 1960s that signified societal decline
B)the War on Poverty of the 1960s that created a criminal class
C)the economic downturn in the 1970s that identified people to blame for social problems
D)the conservative backlash to the 1960s
Q5) How do physical and symbolic boundaries work to define groups?
Q6) What is the opposite of interested punishment? Explain.
Page 18
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Chapter 17: Social Movements and Revolutions
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Q1) Early theorists in the nineteenth century more often studied protesters in crowds as __________.
A)utopians
B)frustrated,sometimes irrational individuals
C)mentally disturbed
D)immoralists
Q2) The Arab Spring revolt in Morocco resulted in the overthrow of its monarchy.
A)True
B)False
Q3) Given the historical victories of the pro-choice movement,why can success be a setback over the long term?
A)They are not victories because true victories have to be accomplished in stages so as to foil the opposition.
B)They are poorly adapted for compromise and so such victories do not last or result in counterproductive outcomes.
C)There is no success in governmental fiat.It must be achieved collectively,with supermajorities.
D)Victories that are sweeping in nature can inspire countermovements.
Q4) Describe at least two social movements that have become more global in scope.
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Chapter 18: Environmental Sociology
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Sample Questions
Q1) Despite efforts to educate the public and establish recycling programs,each American produces approximately __________ of trash in a day.
A)5 pounds
B)25 pounds
C)2.5 pounds
D)10 pounds
Q2) The field of __________ revealed how so-called primitive societies __________ nature.
A)anthropology;are dependent on
B)environmental sociology;are interdependent on C)ecology;are based on D)archaeology;worship
Q3) Sociology's contribution to the study of environmental problems is the creation of an environmental movement.
A)True
B)False
Q4) Discuss Allan Schnaiberg's assessment of the uncontrolled destruction of the environment as an essential feature of the contemporary economic system.What is the end result of his "treadmill of production"?
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Chapter 19: Population, aging, and Health
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Sample Questions
Q1) Why might healthy life expectancy be important to know for social planners building retirement communities?
Q2) __________ refers to the tendency of a population that has been changing in size to continue to change in size even if factors such as fertility and mortality have shifted to levels that would,in the long run,imply no change in population size.
A)Population expectancy
B)Population momentum
C)Population parity
D)The push-pull theory of population dynamics
Q3) A key adjective associated with chronic diseases or chronic health conditions is
A)acute
B)mild
C)persistent
D)recurring
Q4) Describe the three stages of the life-course (perspective)model that sociologists consider when they examine health issues and demographics.
Q5) Describe,in brief,the process of replacement fertility for a nation or region.
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Chapter 20: Globalization
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Sample
Questions
Q1) Prior to the rise of capitalism,what was the traditional means of survival among peasants?
A)selling produced goods at local markets
B)working for wages in rural communities
C)working their own land with their own labor
D)leasing their own land for agricultural production
Q2) Costa Rican textile producers who successfully push American textile products out of local Costa Rican markets have,in economic terms,accomplished what?
A)import stabilization
B)import substitution
C)market-friendly globalization
D)trade liberalization
Q3) Between 1820 and 1914,more than __________ miles of railroad were laid in the United States
A)250,000
B)350,000
C)450,000
D)550,000
Q4) What did the railway and the steamship do to bring about globalization?
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Chapter 21: Social Theory
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Sample Questions
Q1) Who is credited with inventing the concept of the self-fulfilling prophecy?
A)Simone de Beauvoir
B)James Coleman
C)Michel Foucault
D)Robert Merton
Q2) The Sociology Project focuses attention on three of Durkheim's contributions to sociology.What are they?
A)economic productivity,globalization,and social facts
B)religion as a force in modern life,social facts,and economic productivity
C)social solidarity,globalization,and social facts
D)social facts,social solidarity,and religion as a force in modern life
Q3) With which religious faith did Weber associate the early adoption of capitalism?
A)Catholicism
B)Jainism
C)Judaism
D)Protestantism
Q4) Symbolic interactionism focuses on individuals and individual action as heavily shaped by society and its constituent parts.
A)True
B)False
23
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