PRACTICE TEST ONE

Directions:  This exercise is designed to help you prepare for the first test.  Make sure you have read all your assigned materials and reviewed your lecture notes before attempting this.   Below are 33 multiple choice questions based upon information from your text readings and lectures. Print off the questions and circle the answers you think are correct.  Scroll down to the "answers" link and "click" on it.  This will bold and color the correct answers; check your answers. Review those areas in your readings and notes where you missed a question.  Keep in mind, this is not meant to be taken as a question bank for your test - but as an interactive example of the format and perspective those questions will take.

1. __________ is the ability to see the relationship between individual experience and linkage to the larger society.
A. cultural relativity
B. ethnocentrism
C. sociological imagination 

2. ______ was a perspective employed by Auguste Comte which assumed that there were underlying laws or rules which determined actions and reactions.
A. scientific philosophy
B. scientology
C. positivism

3. Durkheim beleived sociologist should study patterned ways of acting and thinking which originated outside of the individual that he termed ________.
A. social institutions
B. social facts
C. sentient gerbils 

4. ___________ occurs when society evolves toward an environment in which social structures that stress efficiency, calculability, predictability, and technological control increasingly grow in influence and power.
A. social coordination
B. rationalization
C. stratification

5. ____________ is based upon the assumption that the nature of society is orderly and stable.
A. conflict
B. symbolic interactionism
C. functionalism

6. A ___________ is a scientifically derived understanding, explanation, or model about something.
A. theory
B. roller derby
C. statement

7. Which theory type would explain individual social interactions as being directed by individual behavior motivated through goal orientation?
A. Functionalist
B. Interactionism
C. Conflict theory

8. Which level of social inquiry would be best to explain how macro level entities interact with each other on a worldwide system level?
A. Macro
B. Meso
C. Micro

9. Which theory type believes that competition between groups of people creates social evolution?
A. Functionalism
B. Conflict
C. Interactionism

10. Which type of variable is commonly called the "effect"?
A. Independent
B. Dependent
C. Constant

11. Which level does functionalism work within?
A. Macro
B. Micro
C. Meso

12. Which type of variable is commonly called the "cause"?
A. Independent
B. Dependent
C. Constant

13. Which theory type ignores competition as a natural occurrence within society?
A. Functionalism
B. Conflict
C. Interactionism

14. What level do sociologists study society when they examine patterns of face-to-face social 
interactions between human beings?
A. Macro
B. Meso
C. Micro

15. When replication over a long period of time and in many different places fails to disprove a theory ________ is
accomplished.
A. verification
B. Replication
C. a caramel sundae 

16. What involves the application of the scientific method to the study of society and human behavior?
A. philosophy
B. social science
C. feelings

17. What approach involves not using your own values and beliefs to attempt to understand or explain the workings of another society or culture?
A. "culture-free" sociology
B. "value-laden" sociology
C. "value-free" sociology

18. What approach involves using the values, norms, and beliefs of a society or culture to understand and explain it?
A. "value-free" sociology
B. "culture-free" sociology
C. cultural relativity

19. What term refers to measuring what your think you are in a social study?
A. validity
B. reliability
C. operationalization

20. What social theorists believe society is formed and maintained through face-to-face social interactions?
A. Interactionists
B. Conflict theorists
C. Calvinists

21. Sociology is a ______________.
A. social philosophy
B. social science
C. social art

22. __________ involves applying the scientific method to studying social life.
A. Philosophy
B. Posivitism
C. Cosomology

23. ____________ stated that societies evolve from lower to higher forms and originally coined the phrase "survival of the fittest."
A. Ed McMann
B. Herbert Spencer
C. Charles Darwin

24. _________ held that economics was the key force of social change.
A. Karl Marx
B. Max Weber
C. Stan Lee

25. __________ held that religion was the key force of social change.
A. Karl Marx
B. Max Weber
C. James T. Kirk

26. A ____________ is a macro level concept that represents a system of interrelated parts called institutions (such as education, language, religion, economic system, and family structure) that form a complete way of life for its participant such by developing and maintaining rules of behavior such as beliefs, values, and norms.
A. subculture
B. culture
C. Bike Week

27. A ____________ is designed to allow everyone in a population having the same chance of being selected.
A. Random sample
B. Scientific sample
C. Blind dating

28. ________ allow people to answer in their own words.
A. Open ended questions
B. Sand script
C. Closed ended questions

29. During the experimental phase of the scientific method the ___________ might be exposed to the independent variable
A. Control group
B. Experimental group
C. Yuppies

30. ____________ are the physical products of a culture. You can see, touch, feel, and taste these.
A. Material culture
B. Empirical culture
C. Equiangular culture

31. __________ is the tendency to use one's own culture as a source of reference for judging the ways of other societies and should be avoided in sociology.
A. Value free sociology
B. Cultural relativity
C. Ethnocentrism

32. __________ norms that are not strictly enforced, are usually limited to a specific time and place.
A. Morals
B. Folkways
C. Mores

33. The key characteristic that separates sociological studies from other social sciences is _______.
A. sociologists don't use deodorant when conducting experiments
B. sociologists attempt to approach their studies from a value-free perspective
C. sociologists use variables that are much larger in scale than other social scientists.

Answers