Exam 5: Public Opinion: How Are Americans Voices Measured, and Do They Matter

Explain the role of accurate and reliable information in the political process.

Researchers with the Pew Center periodically administer an instrument called ______, which is a test administered to random samples of Americans with questions covering political figures and current issues.

Random digital dialing is guaranteed to produce representative random samples using computer-generated random telephone numbers.

How does the story of Michael Brown and the protests in Ferguson, Mo., demonstrate the need for and value of information?

"Do you approve of the president's radical immigration policy?" is an example of a well-worded survey question.

American women are more likely to identify and vote for Democratic Party candidates than men, who are more likely to vote for Republican Party candidates. This represents the ______ in American politics.

Have the events of Ferguson and the story of Michael Brown impacted American political opinions today? How can we measure this impact in an accurate and cost-effective manner? How can political information presented in the text be used to prove or disprove your initial answer?

John Crawford was shot and killed inside of a Walmart in Dayton, Ohio, in 2014 by ______.

Which political party, based on the modern usage of the term, refers to support for an emphasis on individual liberty and argues that governmental involvement in the lives of Americans should be as minimal as possible?

A random sampling has been taken from a normally distributed American population of respondents with 60% white, 30% black, 10% Hispanic, 50% male, and 50% female. The sample contains the following characteristics: 90% white, 10% black, 0% Hispanic, 50% male, and 50% female. This sampling is likely to contain which of the following sampling errors?

An academic political researcher would be more apt to use which of the following poll types in order to obtain reliable information?

Scientific polling can accurately measure what people think by sampling a small number of people.

The degree of change over time in response to differently worded survey questions or in different contexts of a particular opinion is defined as ______.

A political candidate has constructed a survey instrument and intends to administer it to a randomly selected sampling of respondents who are divided by geographic region, political party membership, age, gender, and ethnicity. This would be an example of a ______.

The president's role in focusing Americans' attention on specific issues and events and in making sense of tragedies and challenges is referred to as being the chief ______.

The protests in Ferguson, Mo., were centrally concerned with ______.

Which one of the following legislators stated, "There are virtually no African American males, including congressmen, actors, athletes, and office workers, who have not been stopped at one time or another for driving while black"?

Civic education aims to introduce citizens to politics and helps them develop the ability to interpret and make sense of civic knowledge; where do citizens obtain their formal civic education from?

The majority of individuals who lack necessary levels of political information are described as ______.

When the race or ethnicity of respondents and interviewers impacts the outcome of a survey, political scientists refer to this as ______.