Sociology: 50 review questions

___ groups are characterized by face-to-face interaction, high levels of cooperation, feelings of belonging where group members associate in order to spend time together.

Primary

___ refers to the ways different categories of inequality (such as race, gender, class) intersect to shape the lives of individuals and groups.

intersectionality

TRUE or FALSE: Since the 1950s, unionization in the U.S. has been increasing.

true

TRUE or FALSE: What counts as deviance can vary across cultures or over time.

true

Which theoretical paradigm sees social conflict as the basis of society and social change, provides a dynamic model of change, and focuses on social inequality?

Conflict Theory

In the United States, ___ refers to the collection of social institutions that create and enforce laws such as legislatures, police, courts, and prisons.

Criminal Justice System

___ refers to the principle of understanding other cultures on their own terms; not judging or evaluating according to our own culture.

Culture relativism

Which theory, developed by Erving Goffman, views social life similar to a theatrical performance and focuses on impression management.

Dramaturgy

Which sociological theorist looked at solidarity including mechanical and organic solidarity and wrote a famous study titled Suicide?

Emile Durkheim

___ refers to the principle of using one's own culture as the standard by which to evaluate another group, leading to a view that cultures other than our own are abnormal or inferior.

Ethnocentrism

What term, developed by Antonio Gramsci, describes when the dominant culture, without the use of force, persuades the rest of society that its beliefs and values are the only or best values.

Hegemony

Which sociological theorist focused on conflict and class struggle due to the relationship to the means of production?

Karl Marx

Which sociological theorist focused on bureaucracy and rationalization and wrote a famous study titled The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism?

Max Weber

___ refers to the process by which some behaviors or conditions that were once seen as personal problems are redefined as medical issues.

Medicalization

____ refers to the process by a society teaches individuals to become functioning members and the process by which individuals learn and internalize the values and norms of the group.

Socialization

___ is a term coined by C.Wright Mills and refers the quality of mind that allows us to understand the relationship between our individual circumstances and larger social forces or connections between biography and history?

Sociological imagination

Which theoretical paradigm is based on the assumption that society is a unified whole that functions because of the contributions of its separate structures?

Structural Functionalism

Which theoretical paradigm sees interaction and meaning as central to society and assumes that meanings are not inherent but are created through interaction?

Symbolic Interactionism

___ is an institution in which individuals are cut off from the rest of society so they can be controlled and regulated with the purpose of systematically striping away previous roles and identities.

Total institutions

___ refers to an objective measure of poverty such as the inability to meet minimal standards for food, shelter, clothing, or health care; whereas ____ is a measure of poverty based on the standard of living in a particular society.

absolute deprivation, relative deprivation

___ status is a status into which one is born; whereas ___ status is a status earned through individual effort or imposed by others.

ascribed, achieved

___ refers to the legitimate right to wield power.

authority

What are the tastes, habits, and expectations called that children "inherit" (or learn) from their parents and that help to achieve material success in life?

cultural capital

___ refers to a type of health care that treats a disease or condition once it has manifested; whereas __ refers to a type of health care that aims to avoid or forestall the onset of disease by taking preventative measures.

curative, preventative

__ refers to an approach to punishment that relies on the threat of harsh penalties to discourage people from committing crimes.

deterrence

Which of the following was NOT presented as an agent of socialization? a. Family b. School c. Peers d. Media e. All of the above were presented

e

TRUE or FALSE: In the United States, the top causes of death are often acute diseases.

false

TRUE or FALSE: Race is not a social construction because it is natural or biological.

false

TRUE or FALSE: Socialization only occurs in childhood, meaning that adult socialization does not exist.

false

Social movements that are organized around a belief in the social, political, and economic equality of the sexes are called:

feminism

Women are more likely than men to live in poverty, a situation often referred to as:

feminization of poverty

A neighborhood where there is no grocery store but there are more liquor stores, convenience and drug stores, and fast food outlets than most other locations is referred to as a:

food desert

The cultural and economic changes that result from dramatic increases in international trade and exchange are called:

globalization

___ refers the belief in superiority of heterosexuality and heterosexuals.

heterosexism

The ___ variable (also known as the cause) is the factor that is predicted to cause change; whereas the ___ variable (also known as the effect) is the factor that is changed.

independent, dependent

___ culture includes any physical object to which we give social meaning, whereas ___ culture includes ideas associated with a cultural group including ways of thinking and ways of behaving.

material, symbolic

___ studies face-to-face and small group interactions; whereas ___ studies large-scale social structures.

microsociology, macrosociology

___ refers to ideas about characteristics of a group applied to all members of the group and unlikely to change regardless of evidence, whereas ____ refers to unequal treatment of individuals based on membership in a social group.

prejudice, discrimination

____ is research that works with non-numerical data and more often tries to understand how people make sense of their world.

qualitative research

If we are to have a truly egalitarian society, citizens must recognize the racist history of the United States and the social conditions that perpetuate contemporary inequalities. To do this, one must develop:

race consciousness

Sally is a college student and employee at Starbucks. The night before an exam, Sally's boss asks her to work late. Sally is likely to experience ____ due to contradictions of her different roles associated with being a student and an employee.

role conflict

___ refers to the work that involves providing a service; whereas ___ refer to work that primarily deals with information and producing value in the economy through ideas and analysis.

service work, knowledge work

How do most sociologists differentiate between sex and gender?

sex is based on biological factors, while gender is personality traits that a group considers normal for its male and female members

Which perspective claims that notion of gender are socially determined so that the meaning of masculinity and femininity may vary across societies or history?

social constructionism

The economic system based on collective ownership of the means of production and collective distribution of goods and services is called:

socialism

___ refers to an attribute that devalues a person or group's identity and that may exclude those who are devalued from normal social interaction.

stigma

____ refers to changes in the social status of large numbers of people as a result of structural changes in society.

structural mobility

___ refers to an informal public place where people come together regularly for conversation and camaraderie when not at work or at home.

third place

____ crime is committed by a high-status individual in the course of their occupation.

white-collar

How do sociologists define race?

• Socially defined category based on real or perceived biological differences between groups of people • Race is a social construction • Not biological o Greater genetic diversity within racial groups than between them • Racial categories change over time