Deck 3: Symbolic Interactionism and Related Perspectives

Question 1

What is agency? Discuss the main strengths and weaknesses of the symbolic interactionist face of sociological social psychology with reference to the concept of agency.

Answer 1

No Answer

Question 2

Identity theory focuses on:

A)how people construct and modify situational definitions through interaction with others
B)how personality characteristics shape people's face-to-face interactions
C)the effects of individuals on society and its structure
D)the relationship between the content of people's self-concepts and their behaviors
E)why some people view themselves more positively than others

Answer 2

D

Question 3

Identity theory was developed within:

A)the Chicago school of SI
B)the Iowa/Indiana school of SI
C)ethnomethodology
D)psychological social psychology
E)the dramaturgical framework

Answer 3

B

Question 4

Couch's study linking family characteristics (the degree to which parents adhere to a gendered division of household labor) to the content of college students' self-concepts is a good example of research within:

A)Chicago school SI
B)Iowa/Indiana school SI
C)ethnomethodology
D)psychological social psychology
E)the dramaturgical framework

Question 5

In his classic study within the Iowa/Indiana school of SI, Couch found that college males, but not females, were more likely to list gendered statuses (male/female, son/daughter) in response to the Twenty Statements Test when:

A)household tasks in their family were assigned based on gender
B)their parents were divorced or separated
C)they had few student-related responsibilities other than studying and attending class
D)they were close to graduation
E)they were in a serious romantic relationship

Question 6

Who would measure the content of a sample of college students' self-concepts on a survey using the Twenty Statements Test?

A)A Chicago school symbolic interactionist
B)A social behaviorist
C)A sociological social psychologist working within the dramaturgical perspective
D)An ethnomethodologist
E)An Iowa/Indiana school symbolic interactionist

Question 7

Iowa/Indiana school symbolic interactionists typically collect their data using ________________.

A)experiments
B)historical methods
C)in-depth interviews
D)participant observation
E)surveys

Question 8

Which of the following statements does NOT accurately reflect the distinction between the Chicago and Iowa/Indiana schools of symbolic interactionism?

A)Chicago school SI developed out of the Iowa/Indiana school tradition and is unique in that it is associated with the use of laboratory experiments.
B)Iowa/Indiana school SI focuses on the self-concept, whereas Chicago school SI focuses on the self as a process of interaction between the "I" and the "me."
C)Iowa/Indiana school SI is more macro in orientation than Chicago school SI.
D)Iowa/Indiana school SI is similar in focus to social structure and personality (SSP), while Chicago school SI and SSP have little in common
E)Studies in the Chicago school tradition tend to be qualitative, whereas studies in the Iowa/Indiana school tradition tend to be quantitative, in orientation.

Question 9

The characteristics, thoughts, and feelings that people attribute to themselves compose what sociological social psychologists call:

A)the mirage
B)the mirror image
C)the "my"
D)the self
E)the self-concept

Question 10

Becker and Geer, two well-known Chicago school symbolic interactionists, argue that participant observation yields more valid data than in-depth interviews. As they note, data gathered using in-depth interviews may lack validity because people:

A)are often unaware of what they do or why they do it
B)get nervous during interviews, which impairs their ability to answer questions accurately
C)often lie to researchers to make themselves look better
D)tend to withhold information they view as unimportant from the interviewer
E)both a and d

Question 11

Ferris' study on fan-celebrity encounters, discussed in Chapter 3, was used to show that different groups often have different:

A)core values
B)economic means (levels of income and wealth)
C)roles
D)situational definitions
E)social networks

Question 12

Even when they did things like following celebrities from staged events to airports or restaurants, the fans Ferris interviewed for her study of fan-celebrity encounters did not define themselves as:

A)bored
B)good detectives
C)hardcore fans
D)socially integrated
E)stalkers

Question 13

In class, college students often rely on a few of their peers to respond to the professor's questions and offer comments on the material presented. Because someone is participating, they know that they won't be called on. This dynamic reflects what symbolic interactionists Karp and Yoels refer to as the:

A)dispersal of burden
B)consolidation of responsibility
C)control of conversational outflow
D)diffusion of responsibility
E)management of accounts

Question 14

In their classic symbolic interactionist study of student participation in college classes, Karp and Yoels found that:

A)both students and professors recognize that many students don't participate in class because they haven't done the assigned reading
B)males participate in class more when the professor is male than when the professor is female
C)professors believe that smaller classes (seminars) attract better students than larger classes
D)students and professors have different beliefs about what constitutes an appropriate level of contribution to the class discussion on the part of students
E)the amount of student participation that occurs in classroom settings is unrelated to class size

Question 15

Working within the Chicago school of SI, Schippers studied the interactions that occurred between lower-class African American girls and their White, female college student mentors. The results of Schipper's study suggest that:

A)intelligence is more important than gender or race in determining people's power over others and their future behaviors
B)mentoring programs and diversity training for school staff tend to result in positive race relations among students and between students and teachers
C)people rely on status symbols (e.g., material possessions or a title) when striving for dominance in their interactions with others
D)the power dynamic that emerges in people's face-to-face interactions may not reflect the power structure that exists within the larger society
E)both b and c

Question 16

According to Chicago school symbolic interactionists, behavior is a product of:

A)objective reality
B)people's innate needs or desires
C)personality characteristics
D)situational definitions
E)social norms

Question 17

Situational definitions are:

A)norms
B)invariable meanings attached to people and events
C)perceptions
D)psychological constructs unrelated to social interaction
E)social facts

Question 18

Chicago school symbolic interactionists focus on:

A)how people present themselves to others in public settings
B)how people respond to disruptions to the flow of everyday social life
C)how social experiences differ across social categories (e.g., men vs. women)
D)the social construction of meaning in group encounters
E)the link between the statuses people occupy and how they define themselves

Question 19

According to Goffman, the key contributor to the dramaturgical perspective, ______________________ is often contagious.

A)anger
B)embarrassment
C)fear
D)guilt
E)happiness

Question 20

The dramaturgical perspective focuses on:

A)the accounts people generate to explain the behaviors of others
B)how people make sense of their experiences
C)the meanings people construct through face-to-face interactions
D)the process of impression management
E)the effects of the content of people's self-concepts on specific behaviors

Question 21

What do symbolic interactionists study? Why do extreme situations, like the plane crash in the Andes described in this chapter, provide such good examples of the social processes of interest to symbolic interactionists?

Question 22

What is microsociology? List the theoretical frameworks considered to be within the realm of microsociology and indicate why they belong in this category.

Question 23

Compare and contrast the three theoretical frameworks within the symbolic interactionist face of sociological social psychology.

Question 24

Discuss the role of language in social life from the perspective of a symbolic interactionist. Why is language also a key interest of ethnomethodologists?

Question 25

How do (Chicago school) symbolic interactionism and ethnomethodology differ in focus? Why did Garfinkel find it useful to have his students violate social norms and observe people's behaviors? That is, why are breaching experiments an appropriate method for the study of everyday social behaviors for the ethnomethodologist?

Question 26

Briefly describe the focus of ethnomethodology. How is ethnomethodology different from symbolic interactionism? Why is ethnomethodology considered to be within the symbolic interactionist face of social psychology?

Question 27

Discuss the strategies that college students use to reveal good grades to peers without appearing conceited. Which, if any, of these responses have you used or observed among others? Are high school students likely to use similar tactics to let others know they did well on a test? Why do you think there is likely to be this consistency or lack of consistency between high school and college students when it comes to the implementation of classroom impression management strategies?

Question 28

What happens to students who don't fulfill normative expectations pertaining to the revelation of good exam grades? Use this situation to illustrate the focus of Goffman's dramaturgical approach.

Question 29

Discuss the differences between front stage and back regions, as identified by Goffman.

Question 30

Give an overview of Goffman's dramaturgical perspective. How does this model of social behavior differ from the symbolic interactionist perspective (i.e., Chicago school symbolic interactionism)? Describe how the concepts and processes Goffman identified have been applied to behavior in college classrooms. To what extent does the dramaturgical approach enhance our understanding of behavior in this and other social settings?

Question 31

Contrast the Chicago and Iowa/Indiana schools of symbolic interactionism. In doing so, highlight the key defining characteristic of each framework and use examples of specific theories and/or studies to illustrate the distinction between these two traditions. Why, despite their differences, are both schools of thought are considered to be symbolic interactionist? Which of the two perspectives do you think is the most useful for understanding human social behavior? Why do you fav

Question 32

Briefly describe the difference between the Chicago school and the Iowa/Indiana school of symbolic interactionism. Why do Chicago school symbolic interactionists favor qualitative over quantitative methods of data collection (i.e., why do they conduct field or ethnographic research rather than using surveys or experiments)? Why do Iowa/Indiana school symbolic interactionists use surveys as a method of data collection?

Question 33

What makes fan-celebrity encounters unique? How has this presented problems for both celebrities and fans? Are the patterns of interaction described by Ferris surprising given people's levels of media exposure within this culture? Why or why not?

Question 34

Compare your classroom experiences to the patterns identified by Karp and Yoels in the 1970s. What would you say has changed, and what hasn't changed, in the past thirty to forty years? What is the consolidation of responsibility? To what extent do Karp and Yoels' arguments about the consolidation of responsibility apply to contemporary college students?

Question 35

Why do Becker and Geer believe that participant observation is a superior to in-depth nterviews? Use results from the article by Besen, on teens who work in coffee shops, to support or refute Becker and Geer's arguments. What would Becker and Geer say about the use of surveys to assess people's perceptions and behaviors?

Question 36

Referencing the last question, describe the different situational definitions that were constructed, and the ways in which the individuals' perceptions might have been influenced by their social characteristics (e.g., gender, race/ethnicity, level of education, occupation, or marital status), goals, or previous experiences. What impact did these varying situational definitions have on people's behavior?

Question 37

The notion that situational definitions play a major role in shaping people's behavior is key to the symbolic interactionist perspective. Give an example, from personal experience or a public (media) account, of an instance where two or more people arrived at different definitions of the same situation. Describe the events that actually took place (as accurately as you can)

Question 38

What is a situational definition? Give an example from the assigned reading, lecture, or your personal experience of an interactive setting in which people had competing situational definitions. Why is this concept so central to Chicago school symbolic interactionism?

Question 39

Why is it useful to study extreme situations, like the experience of the survivors of the plane crash discussed in Chapter 3, who had to eat human flesh in order to stay alive?

A)People are more willing to tell others how they really feel, and to act more authentically, after experiencing a crisis.
B)People's true natures are evident in extreme situations because characteristics that typically serve as the basis of power (e.g., gender, class, and race/ethnicity) don't matter in these settings.
C)The fear individuals experience in crisis situations enhances their memories, so they are readily able to report the events that transpired to an interviewer.
D)The social processes through which people construct their realities are more obvious in extreme than in common, everyday situations.
E)These events show us how people would act if they existed outside of a society.

Question 40

Suppose that a professor is ten minutes late for class. From a symbolic interactionist perspective, the meaning of this behavior is a function of:

A)the content of the role expectations she violated
B)the initial cause of her action
C)the quality of her excuse for being late
D)the school's written guidelines for faculty conduct
E)the students' responses to her tardiness

Question 41

Symbolic interactionists believe that meanings shape behavior, that meanings emerge in social interaction, and that meanings:

A)are tied to societal beliefs and social norms
B)become linked with individuals and events through the process of objectification
C)change with changes in behavior
D)primarily reflect internal motivations and drives
E)rarely change unless there is widespread consensus within society that they are unclear or cumbersome

Question 42

Ethnomethodologists have used breaching experiments to study:

A)how people cope with embarrassment in public settings
B)the nature of people's social relationships and when they are most likely to forgive
C)transgressions of family members and friends
D)the procedures people use to make sense of unusual and unexpected situations
E)when social norms have their strongest hold on people
F) why most people adhere to prevailing social norms

Question 43

Ethnomethodologists often study accounts. Accounts are:

A)philosophies of life, typically acquired during childhood or early adolescence
B)the combined rewards and costs associated with different realms of social life that are stored within the mind
C)the explanations people generate to give meaning to their experiences
D)the mechanisms underlying the processes through which people seek out rewards and minimize costs their social relationships
E)stories about or rationales for behavior that vary among group members and thus cause conflict within the group

Question 44

Ethnomethodologists are primarily interested in:

A)how people maintain a coherent sense of reality
B)the effects of emotions like embarrassment on the role-taking process
C)the effects of statuses like gender and race/ethnicity on people's situational definitions
D)the meanings people construct through their face-to-face interactions
E)the process of impression management

Question 45

People high in public self-consciousness are aware of and concerned about the impressions they convey to others across social situations. Public self-consciousness, which is measured using a series of survey questions, is within the realm of psychological social psychology because:

A)it is a psychological trait
B)it is measured using a survey rather than participant observation
C)it pertains only to public settings
D)it reflects differences between groups that are biological based
E)it varies across interactive encounters

Question 46

People who are both highly aware of and concerned about the impressions they convey to others across social situations are high in what psychological social psychologists refer to as:

A)front region fright
B)public self-consciousness
C)self-objectification
D)self-reflexive concern
E)social anxiety

Question 47

Albas and Albas found that students who scored well on an exam ("Aces") often offered excuses for the poor test performance of others ("Bombers") when interacting with the latter individuals. "Aces" did this in order to help "Bombers":

A)develop proactive study plans for future tests
B)realize that the professor is not the sole authority on who does or doesn't understand course material
C)recognize that many factors other than ability or intelligence are reflected in an individual's exam score
D)reinvigorate
E)save face

Question 48

Goffman (the dramaturgical approach) calls the physical entities (e.g., clothing, a backpack, or books in an office) we use to aid us in conveying positive impressions to others:

A)artifacts
B)decoys
C)face savers
D)masks
E)props

Question 49

Goffman described the "back region" as:

A)areas of our true selves we seek to avoid
B)environments most people would define as chaotic
C)situations within which we stage performances for others
D)the part of the brain inaccessible to conscious thought
E)the places where we let our guard down

Question 50

Given their design, the breaching experiments used by ethnomethodologists to study how people construct coherent and meaningful realities can be considered true experiments.

Question 51

Ethnomethodologists study the process of role taking and how people come to understand what others are thinking.

Question 52

The dramaturgical perspective is more macro in focus than Iowa/Indiana school symbolic interactionism and ethnomethodology.

Question 53

The label ""microsociology"" applies to most of the research conducted within the symbolic interactionist face of sociological social psychology.

Question 54

In their research, discussed in Chapter 3, Albas and Albas use the terms "Ace" and "Bomber" to refer to college students' potential dates.

Question 55

Women are more likely than men to list their gender on the Twenty Statements Test.

Question 56

The self-concept and is similar to Mead's "I" phase of the self.

Question 57

Iowa/Indiana school symbolic interactionism is more macro in focus than Chicago school symbolic interactionism.

Question 58

Chicago school symbolic interactionists study how people construct meanings through their face-to-face interactions.

Question 59

In the classic breaching experiment discussed in Chapter 3, Garfinkel, the founder of ethnomethodology, had students disrupt their family members' realities by:

A)acting as boarders in their own homes
B)asking their parents for money every day for a month
C)failing to show up for a preplanned holiday dinner
D)pretending they were sick
E)all of the above

Question 60

In his ethnomethodological study of conversations at a race training workshop, discussed in Chapter 3, Whitehead found that individuals tended to avoid directly mentioning race. Study participants also downplayed the significance of race as an explanation for people's experiences. Whitehead argues that this is important because, at the macro level, conversations that reflect the commonly held assumption that race is no longer important in shaping people's experiences:

A)increase social integration and equality across groups within society
B)highlight the effectiveness of race training workshops and other programs that emphasize diversity-related issues
C)make characteristics other than race, like gender, more salient bases of identity
D)reproduce existing patterns of racial/ethnic inequality
E)show that it is possible to move toward a "raceless" society

Question 61

Which of the following studies was used in Chapter 3 to illustrate the focus of ethnomethodology?

A)Albas and Albas' study of college students' impression management strategies following the return of examinations
B)Ferris' analysis of fan-celebrity encounters
C)Karp and Yoels' analysis of student-professor interaction in college classrooms
D)Karp and Yoels' analysis of student-professor interaction in college classrooms
E)Whitehead's study of the conversations that occurred among participants in a race training workshop

Question 62

According to G. H. Mead, the most influential contributor to the theoretical perspective now called symbolic interactionism, the extent to which the "me" shapes behavior is primarily a function of:

A)an ongoing interaction between the "I" and the "my"
B)people's past experiences and their desire to impress others
C)the social context in which action occurs
D)the status characteristics of the actor
E)unconscious physiological processes

Question 63

Which of the following tenets of symbolic interactionism is rooted in Mead's "I"?

A)Group members necessarily share a common perspective.
B)Human social behavior always has a spontaneous and creative component.
C)Meanings change with changes in behavior.
D)People create society through their face-to-face interactions.
E)Society shapes people's perceptions and behaviors.

Question 64

Role taking or perspective taking involves:

A)engaging in new activities (e.g., taking on new tasks at work)
B)sharing someone's definition of a situation
C)viewing oneself as an object from the perspective of another person
D)sharing someone else's feelings
E)synthesizing thought, emotion, and action

Question 65

Mead's "I" represents:

A)actions that are geared toward increasing rewards and minimizing punishments
B)conscious thought and other higher-level mental processes
C)humans' tendencies to behave in a selfish or self-interested manner
D)our spontaneous, impulsive reactions to our environment
E)the capacity for empathy and sympathy

Question 66

Mead called a gesture that brings out the same meaning in the person it is directed toward as it does in the person initiating the action a:

A)cognitive designator
B)shared goal
C)significant symbol
D)unit of mental exchange
E)validated sign

Question 67

The three theoretical frameworks within the symbolic interactionist face of sociological social psychology are:

A)behaviorism, social learning theory, and ethnomethodology
B)ethnomethodology, social learning theory, and social exchange theory
C)social conflict, interaction, and social change
D)symbolic interactionism, the dramaturgical perspective, and ethnomethodology
E)the dramaturgical perspective, social exchange theory, and ethnomethodology

Question 68

Theoretical frameworks (also called theoretical perspectives):

A)are cause-and-effect statements that can be tested with data
B)are the same as faces within social psychology
C)involve both deductive and inductive logic and include theories, hypotheses, and specific methodologies
D)provide researchers with sets of concepts and specify how these concepts are related
E)specify relationships between independent and dependent variables

Question 69

Goffman described the "back region" as:

A)areas of our true selves we seek to avoid
B)environments most people would define as chaotic
C)situations within which we stage performances for others
D)the part of the brain inaccessible to conscious thought
E)the places where we let our guard down and prepare for the "front stage"

Question 70

Iowa/Indiana school social psychologists typically collect their data using ________________.

A)experiments
B)historical methods
C)in-depth interviews
D)participant observation
E)surveys

Question 71

Iowa/Indiana school social psychologist typically collect their data using ________________.

A)experiments
B)historical methods
C)in-depth interviews
D)participant observation
E)surveys

Question 72

Who would measure the content of a sample of college students' self-concepts on a survey using the Twenty Statements Test?

A)A Chicago school symbolic interactionist
B)A social behaviorist
C)A sociological social psychologist working within the dramaturgical perspective
D)An ethnomethodologist
E)An Iowa/Indiana school social psychologist

Question 73

Some sociological social psychologists, typically individuals who are macro in orientation, criticize research within the symbolic interactionist face of social psychology (excluding studies within the Iowa/Indiana tradition of SI) for lacking:

A)focus
B)generalizability
C)inductive viability
D)triangular reasoning
E)validity

Question 74

Studies within the symbolic interactionist face of sociological social psychology are distinct from research within the other faces of sociological social psychology in that they provide information about the unique experiences of particular groups within society and:

A)allow researchers to make statements about society as a whole
B)enable researchers to test previously established theories
C)offer insight into how societal patterns are changed or reproduced through social interaction
D)uncover behavioral patterns that can be used to generate predictions about individuals' subsequent actions
E)yield data that are likely to generalize across societies

Question 75

The label ""microsociology"" encompasses all of the theoretical frameworks within the symbolic interactionist face of sociological social psychology except:

A)Chicago school symbolic interactionism
B)Iowa/Indiana school symbolic interactionism
C)ethnomethodology
D)self-consciousness theory
E)the dramaturgical approach

Question 76

Within the symbolic interactionist face of sociological social psychology, ______________ is unique because it focuses more on structure than on agency.

A)Chicago school symbolic interactionism
B)Iowa/Indiana school symbolic interactionism
C)ethnomethodology
D)self-consciousness theory
E)the dramaturgical approach

Question 77

Most research within the symbolic interactionist face of sociological social psychology is:

A)experimental
B)historical
C)qualitative
D)quantitative
E)survey-based

Question 78

Most research within the symbolic interactionist face of sociological social psychology emphasizes:

A)constraint over agency
B)groups or categories of people over individuals
C)how innate predispositions affect individuals and their social interactions
D)the active role people play in constructing their realities
E)the power of social structure in shaping people's behaviors

Question 79

Understanding how social facts constrain behavior is the issue of primary interest to researchers working within the symbolic interactionist framework.