Understanding Society
Midterm Exam
Course Introduction
Understanding Society offers an introduction to the ways in which social structures, institutions, and relationships shape individual and collective experiences. This course explores core sociological concepts such as culture, socialization, class, gender, ethnicity, and social change, providing students with tools to critically analyze contemporary issues. By examining research methodologies and key sociological theories, students gain insight into the complexities of society and the factors that influence social behavior and inequality. Real-world examples and case studies are used to illustrate how social forces impact communities, organizations, and everyday life, fostering a deeper appreciation for the diversity and interconnectedness of human societies.
Recommended Textbook
Sociology The Core 8th Edition by Michael Hughes
Available Study Resources on Quizplus 13 Chapters
1494 Verified Questions
1494 Flashcards
Source URL: https://quizplus.com/study-set/3031
Page 2
Chapter 1: Developing a Sociological Consciousness
Available Study Resources on Quizplus for this Chatper
123 Verified Questions
123 Flashcards
Source URL: https://quizplus.com/quiz/60267
Sample Questions
Q1) Manifest functions are those consequences that are neither intended nor recognized.
A)True
B)False
Answer: False
Q2) __________ refers to processes of social life that pattern institutional development and have to do with social change.
A) Social dynamics
B) Social statics
C) Organic solidarity
D) Mechanical solidarity
Answer: A
Q3) Symbolic interactionists say that we experience the world as a(n)__________ reality.
A) objective
B) experimental
C) constructed
D) solid
Answer: C
To view all questions and flashcards with answers, click on the resource link above.
Page 3
Chapter 2: Culture and Social Structure
Available Study Resources on Quizplus for this Chatper
118 Verified Questions
118 Flashcards
Source URL: https://quizplus.com/quiz/60262
Sample Questions
Q1) Sociologist William H.Sewell,Jr. ,observed that structure is static,not dynamic.
A)True
B)False
Answer: False
Q2) Gestures used to communicate numbers are universal.
A)True
B)False Answer: False
Q3) The existence of cultural universals is due to
A) a law of nature.
B) the tendency of all people to desire the same,specific activities and relationships in their lives.
C) a human instinct.
D) people facing the same broad problems of survival.
Answer: D
Q4) Values are very stable,and never change over time.
A)True
B)False Answer: False
To view all questions and flashcards with answers, click on the resource link above. Page 4
Chapter 3: Socialization
Available Study Resources on Quizplus for this Chatper
122 Verified Questions
122 Flashcards
Source URL: https://quizplus.com/quiz/60261
Sample Questions
Q1) Self-esteem includes our
A) perception of how others appraise us.
B) comparison of our performance,ability,or other characteristics to those of others.
C) belief that we are responsible for a characteristic that results in credit or blame.
D) All of the choices are correct.
Answer: D
Q2) In their investigation of high school students,Bonnie Barber and her colleagues discovered that the crowd identities and activities of tenth graders fail to predict adult outcomes.
A)True
B)False
Answer: False
Q3) The "generalized other" is an attitude children acquire that is essentially the attitude of their parents.
A)True
B)False
Answer: False
To view all questions and flashcards with answers, click on the resource link above. Page 5
Chapter 4: Social Groups and Formal Organizations
Available Study Resources on Quizplus for this Chatper
115 Verified Questions
115 Flashcards
Source URL: https://quizplus.com/quiz/60260
Sample Questions
Q1) On college campuses,hiking and biking groups,service organizations,and intramural sports teams are prime examples of ______________ organizations.
A) utilitarian
B) mortification
C) coercive
D) voluntary
Q2) A number of forces undermine the operation of the bureaucratic model,including the fact that
A) human beings tend to exist just for the benefit of the organization.
B) bureaucracies tend to be immune to social change.
C) bureaucracies are basically designed with the "average" person in mind.
D) informal organizations develop within the bureaucracy.
Q3) John James found that emotions tend to play a greater role in larger groups than they do in dyads.
A)True
B)False
Q4) The Kennedy administration's Bay of Pigs invasion illustrates Parkinson's Law.
A)True
B)False
To view all questions and flashcards with answers, click on the resource link above. Page 6
Chapter 5: Deviance and Crime
Available Study Resources on Quizplus for this Chatper
115 Verified Questions
115 Flashcards
Source URL: https://quizplus.com/quiz/60259
Sample Questions
Q1) ________ is NOT one of the traditional purposes of imprisonment?
A) Punishment
B) Rehabilitation
C) Recidivism
D) Selective confinement
Q2) Deviance can be viewed as having positive,or "integrative," consequences for social life.
A)True
B)False
Q3) When individuals incorporate within their personalities the standards of behavior prevalent within the larger society,the process is called
A) internalization.
B) socialization.
C) conformity.
D) normative intervention.
Q4) When they study deviance,sociologists tend to focus on what is "wrong" with people who deviate.
A)True
B)False
To view all questions and flashcards with answers, click on the resource link above. Page 7
Chapter 6: Social Stratification
Available Study Resources on Quizplus for this Chatper
118 Verified Questions
118 Flashcards
Source URL: https://quizplus.com/quiz/60258
Sample Questions
Q1) Karl Marx believed that the key to social stratification in capitalist societies is the separation between those who own and control the means of production and those who are the laborers.
A)True
B)False
Q2) Regarding the "American Dream,"
A) growing numbers of Americans are not achieving prosperity.
B) the middle class appears to be shrinking.
C) more and more Americans are experiencing prosperity.
D) growing numbers of Americans are not achieving prosperity and the middle class appears to be shrinking are correct.
Q3) ____________________ requires that people be distributed within the social structure so that statuses are filled and their accompanying roles performed.
A) Social differentiation
B) Social gradation
C) Social degradation
D) Social stratification
Q4) Describe the variations in people's style of life based on their social class.
To view all questions and flashcards with answers, click on the resource link above. Page 8
Chapter 7: Inequalities of Race and Ethnicity
Available Study Resources on Quizplus for this Chatper
117 Verified Questions
117 Flashcards
Source URL: https://quizplus.com/quiz/60257
Sample Questions
Q1) The attitude that insists that immigrants give up their cultural traits for those of the dominant American group is called the
A) melting pot tradition.
B) Anglo-conformity view.
C) pluralistic view.
D) institutional racism view.
Q2) "A racially or culturally self-conscious population,with hereditary membership and a high degree of in-group marriage,that suffers oppression at the hands of a dominant segment of a nation-state" defines a(n)
A) in-group.
B) bureaucracy.
C) reference group.
D) minority group.
Q3) Symbolic racism has declined in recent years due to the feeling among whites that African Americans finally have been getting what they rightly deserve.
A)True
B)False
Q4) Explain the meanings of and relationship between prejudice and discrimination.
To view all questions and flashcards with answers, click on the resource link above. Page 9
Chapter 8: Gender Inequality
Available Study Resources on Quizplus for this Chatper
98 Verified Questions
98 Flashcards
Source URL: https://quizplus.com/quiz/60256
Sample Questions
Q1) The invisible barriers that prevent women from occupational advancement are referred to as the
A) "sticky floor" mechanism.
B) "glass ceiling."
C) dominant male syndrome.
D) "9 to 5" problem.
Q2) ______________ is NOT considered a patriarchal element of society.
A) Women and children taking the last name of the husband and father
B) Women being responsible for most household chores and child care
C) Women being able to vote,sign contracts,and get credit
D) Men having more social,economic,and political power than women
Q3) Our __________________ emerge(s)as we enact gender roles and as others react to those roles as being either male or female.
A) gender identity
B) primary sex characteristics
C) secondary sex characteristics
D) sexism fantasies
Q4) Today,corporate boards of directors are made up primarily of women.
A)True
B)False
10
To view all questions and flashcards with answers, click on the resource link above.
Chapter 9: Political and Economic Power
Available Study Resources on Quizplus for this Chatper
118 Verified Questions
118 Flashcards
Source URL: https://quizplus.com/quiz/60255
Sample Questions
Q1) Multinational corporations
A) are increasingly taking on a transnational character.
B) make it increasingly difficult to say what is an "American," "Japanese," or "Swedish" product.
C) have made it impossible to purchase a completely American-made vehicle.
D) All of the choices are correct.
Q2) One factor identified as promoting a climate favorable to a stable democracy is the existence of conflict associated with a competitive struggle over positions of power.
A)True
B)False
Q3) The collapse of communism in much of the world increased the appeal of Marxist explanations of the state.
A)True
B)False
Q4) Americans tend to accept the use of power by government because they believe that policies and orders are developed according to the rules in which they believe.
A)True
B)False
To view all questions and flashcards with answers, click on the resource link above. Page 11
Chapter 10: The Family
Available Study Resources on Quizplus for this Chatper
116 Verified Questions
116 Flashcards
Source URL: https://quizplus.com/quiz/60266
Sample Questions
Q1) Men and women both engage in acts of family violence,but
A) men do more physical damage than their female partners.
B) women do more physical damage than their male partners.
C) they both do very little physical damage to each other.
D) the children are the primary cause of their violence.
Q2) The alternative "essentialist" view argues that homosexual orientation is
A) learned through socialization.
B) psychological.
C) either inborn or is fixed very early in one's development and is an inherent part of what an individual is.
D) sociological.
Q3) We tend to select marital partners
A) who are far more physically attractive than we are.
B) who are generally less physically attractive than we are.
C) who are similar in physical attractiveness to ourselves.
D) almost totally on the basis of personality and temperament.
Q4) The goal of "being married to the same person for life" ranks well above the goal of "having a happy marriage."
A)True
B)False
Page 12
To view all questions and flashcards with answers, click on the resource link above.
Chapter 11: Religion, Education, and Medicine
Available Study Resources on Quizplus for this Chatper
117 Verified Questions
117 Flashcards
Source URL: https://quizplus.com/quiz/60265
Sample Questions
Q1) __________ percent of U.S.adults meet the medical definition of obesity.
A) Twenty-one
B) Thirty-one
C) Forty-six
D) Fifty-six
Q2) _________ is NOT a new arrangement for financing health care in America?
A) Competition in the health industry "marketplace"
B) Keeping people out of hospitals
C) Lowering government involvement in containing health care costs
D) Establishing satellite outpatient medical centers
Q3) According to Durkheim,those things that have to do with the mundane,everyday,and commonplace are the
A) sacred.
B) profane.
C) secular.
D) existential.
Q4) All homeschooling families officially register their children as homeschooled.
A)True
B)False
Q5) Explain the meaning of "civil religion," and discuss its role in society.
Page 13
To view all questions and flashcards with answers, click on the resource link above.
Chapter 12: Population and Environment
Available Study Resources on Quizplus for this Chatper
108 Verified Questions
108 Flashcards
Source URL: https://quizplus.com/quiz/60264
Sample Questions
Q1) The size of preindustrial cities was restricted by all but which of the following?
A) Early cities had trouble with the threats from neighboring cities.
B) The absence of modern medicine and sanitation made life a deadly reality.
C) Thomas Malthus's theorem
D) The class structure prevented rural-urban migration.
Q2) _________________ is a process of clustering wherein individuals and groups are sifted and sorted out in space based on their sharing of certain traits or activities in common.
A) Gentrification
B) Segregation
C) Invasion
D) Urban sprawl
Q3) The number of births per 1,000 women between the ages of 15 and 44 is the
A) crude birth rate.
B) age-specific birth rate.
C) general fertility rate.
D) fecundity rate.
Q4) Explain the three stages of the demographic transition identified in your text.
Q5) Explain the meaning of the term demography,and identify its four components.
To view all questions and flashcards with answers, click on the resource link above. Page 14
Chapter 13: Social Change
Available Study Resources on Quizplus for this Chatper
109 Verified Questions
109 Flashcards
Source URL: https://quizplus.com/quiz/60263
Sample Questions
Q1) A movement that advocates replacement of old ways with something new and different is a
A) reform movement.
B) convergence movement.
C) contagion movement with mass hysteria.
D) revolutionary movement.
Q2) Briefly identify and explain each of Smelser's six determinants of collective behavior noted in your text.
Q3) Contrast the evolutionary theory of social change with the cyclical theory.
Q4) According to the text,the events taking place in the 1930s resulted in duty being the watchword of the times.Today that watchword has been changed to self or identity.
A)True B)False
Q5) Ogburn's "cultural lag" theory proposed that nonmaterial culture is constantly in the process of catching up with changes in the material culture and this produces changes in the society.
A)True B)False
To view all questions and flashcards with answers, click on the resource link above. Page 15