Chapter 6: Public Opinion
The most embarrassing Gallup poll failure in predicting a presidential election was
1948 Truman-Dewey
A properly drawn sample of one thousand individuals has a sampling error of roughly plus or minus
3%
Americans who attend religious services at least once a week are most likely to vote for which political party?
Republican
Currently, the greatest percentage of Americans identify as
democrats or leaning democrat
Historically, dramatic change in party identification is uncommon and is almost always a consequence of
major upheaval
Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann's "spiral of silence" theory contends that
most individuals are reluctant to speak out against the dominant opinion.
What term do scholars use for a purported opinion offered by a respondent who is unfamiliar with the specific issue?
non opinion
The process of political socialization in the United States is
normally cumulative; political beliefs attained earlier in life tend to be retained to a substantial degree.
As an agent of political socialization, the American family will likely have its greatest effect on an individual's
party identification
Which of the following is/are NOT a primary socializing agent?
peers
The process by which individuals acquire their political opinions is called
polticial socialization
The most powerful religious force in contemporary American society is the
religious right
The accuracy of a poll is usually expressed in terms of
sampling error
In general, public opinion
sets limits on government action
According to a recent Pew Research Center poll, young adults are substantially more likely than senior citizens to support
stronger environmental regulations
What was the primary cause for an increase in the public's support for a military invasion of Iraq during the six-month period leading to the start of the war?
the Bush administration's efforts to press the case for war
Which of the following would NOT be considered a secondary socializing agent?
church
Friedrich Engels believed that communism would not take root in the United States because
American workers lacked sufficient class consciousness.
Which of the following is true of Americans' pride in their democracy?
Americans' pride in their democracy has decreased rapidly in recent decades, largely as a result of increasing partisanship.
Which of the following statements is true?
George W. Bush attempted to privatize aspects of Social Security, only to back down in the face of determined resistance.
According to the March 2020 Gallup poll, which of the following statements about party identification is true?
More people identify as Republican than as Democrat.
Which of the following statements about Americans and ideology and political thinking is true?
Most Americans do not demonstrate blind faith in their party of choice.
Which of the following is true of the relationship between public opinion and shifts in major government policies?
On highly salient and emotional issues in particular, public opinion tends to affect policy to a greater degree than policymakers' agendas affect public opinion.
What are the two distinguishing characteristics of political socialization?
Political socialization is cumulative, and it is most heavily developed during childhood.
You are LEAST likely to find a "blue state" in which region?
South
Which of the following actions by a member of Congress would likely lead Edmund Burke to classify that member as a "trustee"?
The member votes against a resolution declaring war, believing it unwise, despite her constituents having a majority opinion in favor of the war.
Which of the following is true of letter writers and demonstrators?
Their opinions tend to be more extreme than those of the population as whole.
Which of the following statements is LEAST likely to apply to economic or social liberals?
They believe that government should be used to promote traditional values.
________ once said that he spent nearly all his adult life in government and yet had never seen a government.
Woodrow Wilson
Party identification refers to
a person's sense of loyalty to a political party
A member of Congress who wants to act on what the majority of his or her constituency thinks on a particular issue would be advised to respond to which of the following indicators?
a poll based on a random selection sample of constituents
Sources of polling error can include
all these answers are correct
Which of the following is true about public opinion polling?
all these answers are correct
A general belief about the role and purpose of government is called
an ideology
In his definition of public opinion, the author states that the politically relevant opinions of private individuals become public opinion when they
are openly expressed
Journalist Walter Lippmann suggested that
effective government cannot be run by politicians that base their public opinions on poll results.
Students are most likely to hear stories about America's heroes and greatness when they are in
elementary school
Which of the following groups in the U.S. shows a higher level of support for collective bargaining?
factory workers
In terms of party identification, slightly more than half of adults call themselves
fully Republican or Democrat
The accuracy of polling is diminished when respondents
give what they regard as the socially correct response to certain questions even though they think differently.
A conservative is opposed to government intervention
in the economic but not the social sphere.
The society of Northern Ireland is presented by the text as a demonstration of what difference with U.S. society?
the lack of crosscutting between groups
To accurately poll the citizens of the United States as opposed to the citizens of a single state,
the sample requirements will be nearly the same.
The key factors in determining the accuracy of an opinion poll are
the size of the sample and whether the sample was selected from the population by a random method.
Women are less likely than men to favor
the use of force to settle international disputes