Deck 7: Social Stratification

Question 1

Which of the following are the largest racial minority groups in the United States?

A) African Americans, Native Americans, and Latinos
B) Asian Americans, Middle Eastern Americans, Native Americans
C) African Americans, Latinos, and Asian Americans
D) Latinos, Chinese Americans, White Russians

Answer 1

African Americans, Latinos, and Asian Americans

Question 2

Many feminists believe the United States is a(n) _____, meaning the nation is socially organized in a way that means men are dominant over women.

A) patriarchy
B) matriarchy
C) oligarchy
D) meritocracy

Answer 2

patriarchy

Question 3

_____ is socially defined on the basis of a presumed common genetic heritage resulting in distinguishing physical characteristics.

A) Race
B) Ethnicity
C) Caste
D) Class

Answer 3

Race

Question 4

What is the difference between social stratification and social differentiation?

A) Social differentiation involves grouping people by hierarchical rank.
B) Social stratification involves grouping people by hierarchical rank.
C) Social stratification involves categorizing people by attributes such as age or what they do for a living.
D) Social differentiation involves categorizing people as superior or inferior.

Question 5

Which term refers to people who occupy the same relative economic rank in a society's stratification system?

A) Social caste
B) Social class
C) Hierarchy
D) Life chance

Question 6

In American society, people are socially located in a class position on the basis of

A) the family into which they are born.
B) grades in high school and college.
C) income, occupation, and education.
D) innate physical superiority.

Question 7

The term meritocracy means those who_____ rise to the top of society.

A) receive the most votes in a democratic election
B) have the most ability, talent, and effort
C) have been able to acquire the greatest wealth
D) make the best moral and ethical decisions

Question 8

Which of the following is a cause of poverty at the nation level?

A) The poorest nations tend to be found in warm climates, where people move more slowly and are less able to accomplish things that lead to wealth.
B) People in poorer nations are more concerned with spirituality than with material goods.
C) The poorest nations were once colonies of the richer nations, and this legacy of exploitation has left them behind in terms of leadership and economy.
D) People in richer nations are more deserving because they work both harder and smarter.

Question 9

The _____ system combines biologically based sex roles with socially created gender roles.

A) sex roles placement
B) gender identity
C) gender placement
D) sex-gender

Question 10

When Gina wears high heels and puts on make up, she is exhibiting behavior associated with her _____, meaning socially constructed behavior.

A) sex role
B) gender role
C) sex-gender system
D) biological imperative

Question 11

What is the difference between sex roles and gender roles?

A) Gender roles apply to women and sex roles apply to men.
B) Gender roles and sex roles are different terms for the same general concept.
C) Gender roles are biologically determined and sex roles are socially determined.
D) Sex roles are biologically determined and gender roles are socially determined.

Question 12

Patricia Hill Collins called the intersection of the heirarchical systems of inequality the

A) heirarchy of subordination.
B) hierarchical matrix.
C) matrix of domination.
D) matrix of subjegation.

Question 13

Which term refers to the different opportunities someone has throughout life to experience the things that make life enjoyable?

A) Hierarchy
B) Class system
C) Social stratification
D) Life chances

Question 14

The caste system refers to the system in India

A) that determines a person's social position for life based on their birth into a particular family.
B) by which people are approved for medical care for broken bones.
C) for choosing people to appear in Bollywood movies.
D) that promotes upward social mobility through education and hard work.

Question 15

All known societies have some system of _____, dividing groups according to rank, caste, or class.

A) social stratification
B) segregation
C) social organization
D) stratified organization

Question 16

Social Darwinism continues to surface under different names, but the basic point of these theories is the same, that

A) the poor are poor because they are genetically inferior.
B) the poor are poor because they are culturally inferior.
C) when poor people rise from poverty, their genes improve to the same degree.
D) when middle-class or wealthy people lose their wealth, it is because they are genetically inferior.

Question 17

Which of the following was the 19th century British philosopher and sociologist who came to the United States to promote the concept of social Darwinism?

A) Arthur Jensen
B) Charles Darwin
C) John Locke
D) Herbert Spencer

Question 18

The term _____ refers to the condition of being culturally rather than physically distinctive.

A) race
B) ethnicity
C) caste
D) class

Question 19

When Max tells his friends that only straight people are normal and all other orientations are deviants, his opinion is based on the concept of

A) repressed homosexuality.
B) heteronormativity.
C) sex-gender systemization.
D) homosapiens.

Question 20

Racial and ethnic _____ is a term that refers to systems of inequality in which some fixed group membership, such as race, religion, or national origin, is a major criterion for ranking social positions and their differential rewards.

A) prejudice
B) socialization
C) determinism
D) stratification

Question 21

Which of the following was the University of California educational psychologist who claimed in 1969 that differences in IQ scores between Blacks and Whites are most likely genetic?

A) Herbert Spencer
B) Arthur Jensen
C) Richard Herrnstein
D) Charles Murray

Question 22

Most good jobs require _____, which can be difficult for the poor to obtain.

A) a college degree
B) a culture of poverty
C) a high level of intelligence
D) industriousness and hard work

Question 23

Critics of the culture of poverty hypothesis argue that the poor

A) retain the dominant values of society and that is why they can climb out of poverty.
B) do not retain the dominant values of society, instead they hold an alternative set of values.
C) do not retain the dominant values of society, instead they have a better set of values.
D) retain the dominant values of society while simultaneously holding an alternative set of values.

Question 24

The chapter suggests that the 2007-2009 recession may have what effect on people's attitudes toward poverty?

A) As more and more people find themselves vulnerable in a struggling economy, individuals may be less likely to blame the poor.
B) As more and more people find themselves vulnerable in a struggling economy, individuals may turn to culture of poverty theories to explain their own situations.
C) Culture of poverty theories will be seen to be accurate despite previous opposition from sociologists and anthropologists.
D) Culture of poverty theories will be the only possible basis for an economic recovery.

Question 25

Charles Murray and Richard Herrnstein published The Bell Curve in 1994, which received a lot of attention for its contention that economic and social hierarchies reflect a single dimension, that of

A) physical fitness, as measured by the President's Fitness Test.
B) income and social status, as measured informally by such factors as country club membership.
C) intellectual ability, as measured by number of academic degrees.
D) cognitive ability as meansured by IQ tests.

Question 26

_____ status refers to the status of an individual that is assigned without reference to abilities or efforts but rather on the basis of age, sex, race, ethnicity, and family background.

A) Ascribed
B) Justified
C) Assumed
D) Earned

Question 27

_____ is when the customary ways of doing things, prevailing attitudes and expectations, and accepted structural arrangements work to the disadvantage of the poor.

A) Systemic bias
B) Culture of poverty
C) Compassion gap
D) Institutional discrimination

Question 28

Lieutenant Governor Andre Bauer, who was running for governor of South Carolina in 2010, compared government assistance to feeding stray animals, saying "They will reproduce." This is an example of the _____ gap.

A) compassion
B) logic
C) intervention
D) ethnic

Question 29

Americans tend to blame poverty on the poor themselves, yet also think the

A) government spends too much on the poor.
B) government spends too little on the poor.
C) poor work too many jobs.
D) poor have no control over their situation.

Question 30

One consequence of the traditional organization of schools and jobs in the United States is that _____ are deprived of equal opportunities for education, jobs, and income.

A) racial minorities
B) white men who were formerly privileged
C) white men, despite their privilege,
D) scholarship students

Question 31

Whose book The Other America: Poverty in the United States was instrumental in sparking the federal government's war on poverty?

A) Herbert Spencer
B) Edward Banfield
C)Michael Harrington
D) Judith Chafel

Question 32

Martin has a minimum-wage job with no health benefits. He does not make enough money to pay for preventive medical care or a healthy diet. When he misses work due to illness, his boss fires him. This is an example of

A) the culture of poverty.
B) a vicious cycle of poverty.
C) corporate crime.
D) what is wrong with Obamacare.

Question 33

Where was the study held in which high-risk African American children were divided into two groups, with one group receiving a high-quality active learning program and the other receiving no preschool education?

A) Tuskegee, Alabama
B) University of North Carolina
C) Abecedarian, New Mexico
D) Ypsilanti, Michigan

Question 34

Social Darwinist theories like those of Jensen, Herrnstein, and Murray seem to provide a scientific justification for racist beliefs by

A) attempting to invalidate the IQ test because it obviously discriminates against the poor.
B) validating the IQ test as a legitimate measure of intelligence.
C) giving credence or prominance to scientific inquiry.
D) rendering the cognitive elite useless and doomed to failure.

Question 35

Judith Chafel reviewed studies about the beliefs of Americans regarding poverty and discovered that most Americans believe that poverty is

A) inevitable, unnecessary, and unjust.
B) a result of societal bias and lack of opportunities.
C) inevitable, necessary, and just.
D) avoidable through social change.

Question 36

Women typically receive lower pay and fewer opportunities for advancement when working in the same kind of jobs as men. Another economic problem for women in the workplace is that they are likely to

A) have less education than men in comparable jobs.
B) have no way to defend themselves against sexual harassment.
C) work at less prestigious jobs than do men.
D) be accused of sexual harassment.

Question 37

Which theorist posited the formation of hereditary castes based on intelligence?

A) Herbert Spencer
B) Arthur Jensen
C) Richard Herrnstein
D) Charles Murray

Question 38

Which of the following was the advisor to Republican presidents who argued that poor people are focused on the present and do not think about the future?

A) Herbert Spencer
B) Edward Banfield
C) Richard Herrnstein
D) Charles Murray

Question 39

The Abecedarian Project conducted at the University of North Carolina demonstrated that high-risk children at a high-quality preschool

A) had raised scores on intelligence tests but that gain faded out by sixth grade.
B) had slightly fewer arrests and higher incidents of home ownership than the controls.
C) earned significantly higher scores on intellectual and academic measures as young adults.
D) showed no difference in short- or long-term achievement than students in a control group.

Question 40

The _____ hypothesis maintains that the poor remain poor because of their values.

A) culture of poverty
B) value of poverty
C) poverty of values
D) poverty and culture

Question 41

Conflict theory fails to address which important question?

A) Does social stratification result in an unequal distribution of rewards?
B) Does social stratification result in discord and coercion?
C) Is social stratification a source of societal friction?
D) Is social stratification universal and necessary?

Question 42

Why is it advantageous to employers to have a large number of marginal people (uneducated and/or undocumented) in the work force?

A) Because desperate people will work for very low wages, thus depressing wages for all workers
B) To have someone to blame for industrial accidents
C) To have someone to blame for unionization efforts, thus depressing interest in unions among more educated workers
D) Because employers want the opportunity to improve society by raising people out of poverty

Question 43

In 2012 _____ people worked full-time in the United States but remained under the poverty level.

A) at least 5.2 million
B) up to1.6 million
C) more than 2.8 million
D) almost half a million

Question 44

Which movement used the slogan "We are the 99 percent"?

A) Civil Rights Movement
B) Labor Movement
C) Occupy Wall Street
D) Suffragist Movement

Question 45

The _____ perspective assumes that stratification reflects the distribution of power in society and is therefore a major source of discord and coercion.

A) economic
B) utility
C) conflict
D) order

Question 46

The chapter asserts that the primacy of profits in capitalism means that employers make investment decisions without regard for their employees. Which of the following does NOT represent that situation?

A) Employers purchase machines to replace workers on an assembly line.
B) Employers require workers to participate in on-the-job training.
C) Owners close a factory in the United States and move their operations overseas to a low-wage country.
D) Employers eliminate traditional pension plans in favor of employee-funded 401K retirement plans.

Question 47

The basic tenet of _____ is that who gets what is determined by private profit rather than by collective need.

A) socialism
B) capitalism
C) collectivism
D) sociology

Question 48

_____ argued that the dominant ideology in any society is always the ideology of the ruling class.

A) Karl Marx
B) Edward Banfield
C) Michael Harrington
D) Judith Chafel

Question 49

Adherents of the _____ model of society believe that inequality is unavoidable and therefore must serve a useful function in society.

A) economic
B) utility
C) conflict
D) order

Question 50

Because capitalism stresses the primacy of maximizing profits, it is in the interest of employers to

A) provide high-quality health care benefits.
B) provide stock options for employees.
C) hire the most qualified workers.
D) keep wages low.