Geology 102 Practice Exam Three
1. True or false, the Mercalli Scale measures the amplitude (intensity) of an earthquake.
2. Which of the following types of seismic waves travel through solids, liquids, and gases?
A. P waves
B. S waves
C. Surface waves
D. Tsunami waves
3. Seismic waves
or
when they encounter a boundary.
A. Laugh or dance
B. Reflect or Refract
C. Slow down or Speed up
D. Vibrate or Shake
4. What is it called when liquid slows down the seismic waves?
A. Xenoliths
B. Refraction
C. Seismic Shadow Zone
D. Seismic Discontinuities
5. What are the two MAIN types of seismic waves?
A. P and S waves
B. Body Waves and Surface Waves
C. P waves and Surface Waves
D. Body Waves and S Waves
6. When a wave bounces back off the layers of the Earth it is called . . .
A. Refraction
B. Seismic Discontinuities
C. Seismic Shadow Zones
D. Reflection
7. The four ways Geologists know what is inside the Earth are:
A. Astronomy, Drilling, Delivery Service, and Seismic Data.
B. Astronomy, Drilling, Reflection, and Refraction.
C. Mercalli Scale, Richter Scale, Seismic Data, and Drilling.
D. Astronomy, Drilling, Delivery Service, and Earthquakes.
8. How do S waves travel through the Earth?
9. How do P waves travel through the Earth?
10. When a seismic wave changes direction and velocity, while traveling from one of Earth’s
boundaries to another, it is said to be:
A. Reflecting
B. Demonstrating the elastic rebound theory
C. Traveling in a straight line
D. Refracting
11. As you move away from Earth’s core, density becomes:
A. Lower
B. Higher
C. Stays the same
D. Mickey Mouse
12. Which is not a type of delivery service?
A. Kimberlites
B. Xenoliths
C. Kaolinites
D. Ophiolites
13. Seismic Shadow Zones:
A. Hypothesize that the outer core is liquid.
B. Are areas where an earthquake can’t be recorded.
C. Zones where the aftershocks are recorded.
D. An s-wave
14. This scale measures the intensity of an earthquake:
A. Mercalli Scale
B. Weigh Scale
C. Seismograph
D. Richter Scale
15. Describe the Elastic Rebound Theory:
16. One factor affecting deformation is temperature, an example of temperature during this
stage would be:
A. A bouncing ball
B. Plastic
C. Ice
D. Rubber
17. Define an Earthquake.
18. Does pressure increase or decrease during confining pressure?
19. What wave is considered a compressional wave?
A. P wave
B. Surface Wave
C. Love Wave
D. S wave
20. Which type of deformation has a permanent change when the material cracks?
A. Ductile
B. Brittle
C. Elastic
D. Rubbery
21. Which type of deformation is not permanent and can return to its original shape?
A. Ductile
B. Rocky
C. Elastic
D. Brittle
22. When a wave bends it is called?
A. Reflection
B. P-waves
C. Refraction
D. S-waves
23. Which waves are more destructive, p-waves or s-waves?
24. Which waves are faster p-waves or s-waves?
25. Which of the following is in the correct order of Earth’s interior (moving from inside to
outer):
A. Crust, Athanosphere, Mantle, Outer Core, Inner Core
B. Outer Core, Inner Core, Mantle, Athanosphere, Crust
C. Inner Core, Outer Core, Mantle, Athanosphere, Crust
D. Inner Core, Outer Core, Athanosphere, Mantle, Crust
26. How do we locate the epicenter of an earthquake?
27. What instrument is used to measure the magnitude of an earthquake?
A. Seismograph
B. Richter Scale
C. Thermometer
D. Blender
28. When stress is applied rapidly, and rocks become brittle:
A. Temperature
B. Composition of rock
C. Stress
D. Rate of Deformation
29. What causes fractures?
A. Folding, Faulting, Heating
B. Folding, Faulting, Stress
C. Folding, Faulting, Cooling
D. Folding, Faulting, Stretching
30. When a rock’s shape and volume is changed by stress is known as:
A. Strain
B. Deformation
C. Folding
D. Faulting
31. What is the difference between a fault and a fold?
32. Explain what chart relates the force that is applied on a rock with the stress and strain?
33. When the bed dips toward the axis, this fold is called?
A. Monocline
B. Syncline
C. Anticline
D. Structural Dome
34. True or false, the dip is the angle between a tilted surface and a horizontal plane.
35. What is the difference between uniform stress and differential stress?
36. In a structural basin where are the youngest rock layers located?
A. Center
B. Outside
C. To the left
D. To the right
37. What are the three types of deformation?
A. Elastic, Ductile, Rubbery
B. Elastic, Rubbery, Brittle
C. Elastic, Ductile, Brittle
D. Rubbery, Ductile, Brittle
38. What are the four factors that affect deformation?
39. When confining pressure increases due to the weight of overlying rocks, materials
become what?
A. Brittle
B. Elastic
C. Plastic
D. Ductile
40. What is the difference between a syncline fold and an anticline?
41. Where is the hanging wall positioned in relation to the footwall in a normal fault?
42. Where is the hanging wall positioned in relation to the footwall in a reverse fault?
43. What is the difference between a structural dome and a structural basin?
44. Which is not a type of change in strain?
A. Expansion
B. Ductile
C. Rotation
D. Contraction
45. Which of the following folds has the youngest rock layers at the axis?
A. Anticline
B. Syncline
C. Monocline
46. In a tsunami, the water moves because:
A. There is a wave of energy moving through the water
B. The ground moved
C. There are strong tides
D. The magnetic pull from the moon
47. Basement block faulting is associated with:
A. Monocline
B. Syncline
C. Anticline
D. Dome
E. Structural Basin
48. True or false: as temperature increases, materials become less ductile?
49. What do we call the process in which the strength and stiffness of soil is reduced by
earthquake shaking?
A. Refraction
B. Liquefaction
C. Liquidation
D. Elastic rebound
50. How do rocks react to different types of stress in an earthquake, fault, and fold?
51. List all the possible causes of faults and folds:
52. What type of stress is associated with normal faults?
A. Tension
B. Compression
C. Shearing
53. What type of stress is associated with reverse faults?
A. Tension
B. Compression
C. Shearing
54. What type of stress is associated with strike slip faults?
A. Tension
B. Compression
C. Shearing
55. What type of fold is associated with structural domes?
56. What type of fold is associated with anticlines and synclines?
57. What type of fold is associated with structural basins?
58. Water is stored in:
A. Hydrosphere
B. Biosphere
C. Lithosphere
D. Atmosphere
E. All of the above
59. Over 99% of water is not available due to?
A. Rivers
B. Glaciers
C. Oceans
D. B and C
60. What percent of surface water lies in the ocean?
A. 98%
B. 95%
C. 97%
D. 99%
61. What is transpiration?
A. Water that moves from one place to another.
B. When materials are transported through water.
C. Plants give off water to atmosphere.
D. How far water is transported.
62. What are the three types of transported loads?
63. What’s the difference between transportation and deposition?
64. How is a natural levee formed?
A. Bars which occur on the inside of a bend.
B. Built by successive floods, piles of sand and gravel build up to confine a stream to its
main channel.
C. Form from abandoned stream meanders which are isolated when meander is cut
off.
D. Forms when stream continues depositing and branching.
65. What is the difference between an alluvial fan and a delta?
66. Where does a syncline fold take place at?
A. Divergent plates
B. Convergent Plates
C. Transform boundaries
D. Subsidents
67. Which is the smallest storage reservoir for water?
A. Ocean
B. Lake
C. River
D. Soil
68. What is infiltration?
69. What are the three types of drainage patterns?
A. Dendritic, radial, and rectangular
B. Dendritic, radial, and square
C. Meandering, braided, and rectangular
D. Dendritic, turbulent, and laminar
70. What are the stages of stream development and how do they differ?
72. List places where water is stored.
73. List ways in which water can be transported.
74. What does a dendritic drainage pattern resemble?
A. Straight line
B. Tree or vein like structure, compacted sediments
C. Meandering
D. Tree or vein like structure, loose sediments.
75. What is associated with rectangular drainage patterns?
A. Volcanoes
B. Plants
C. Joints and fractures
D. Elastic Deformation
76. What is associated with Radial drainage patterns?
77. What are the differences between a youthful stream, mature stream, and old stream?
78. What is the difference between a laminar flow and turbulent flow?
79. Match the following:
1. Discharge
2. Base Level
3. Gradient
A. Downward limit of stream erosion
B. Vertical drop of a stream over a fixed distance
C. The amount (volume) of water passing a certain point in a given amount of time
80. Name three ways that a stream can be eroded.
81. What is the depression in the bedrock beneath a stream that is caused by a swirling rock
caught within them?
A. Gradient
B. Potholes
C. Alluvium
D. Point bar
82. A poorly drained area behind a levee is called a:
A. Yazoo tributary
B. Floodplain
C. Backswamp
D. Delta
83. The flood plain rivers which drain the backswamp and are parallel to the main channel
are:
A. Meandering stream
B. Oxbow lake
C. Natural Levee
D. Yazoo Tributary
84. What is the difference between a braided and meandering stream?
85. Point bars are areas of what on a meandering stream?
86. Cut banks are areas of what on a meandering stream?
87. Stream transport that provides a mechanism by which solid particles of various sizes are
separated is:
A. Sorted by transportation
B. Sorted by deposition
C. Alluvium by deposition
D. Alluvium by transportation
88. Well sorted material deposited by a stream is called:
A. Alluvium by transportation
B. Sorted by deposition
C. Alluvium by deposition
D. Sorted by transportation
89. Where do distributaries occur?
A. At the backswamps
B. Near an oxbow lake
C. Where the main channel comes together, from several smaller channels
D. Where the main channel divides into several smaller channels
90. List reasons why the water cycle is important.
91. What is a stream?
92. What are the three main steps to developing a stream (in order)?
A. Sheet flow, laminar flow, turbulent flow
B. Sheet flow, rills, and streams
C. Laminar flow, turbulent flow, and rills
D. Rills, sheet flow, and streams
93. Meeting infiltration capacity results in:
A. Rills
B. Streams
C. Laminar flow
D. Sheet flow
94. Which of the following are controlling factors that affect the development of a stream?
A. Slope of the land
B. Vegetation Cover
C. Intensity and duration of rainfall
D. Soil texture and prior wetting conditions
E. All of the above
95. Settling velocity is:
A. Particle transport by jumping or skipping along bottom.
B. Speed at which particles fall through a still liquid
C. How fast a stream flows
D. Really Cool!
96. What is saltation?
97. Which of these are controlling factors of the development of a stream?
A. Prior wetting conditions and ice melting
B. Vegetation cover and temperature of climate
C. Slope of land and vegetation cover
D. Intensity and duration of rainfall and the water cycle
98. This stage of stream development produces a wide valley.
A. Youthful
B. Mature
C. Old age
99. Which of the following is not a transported load of sediments?
A. Dissolved load
B. Suspended load
C. Sorted load
D. Bed load
100.
True or false point bars erode cut banks?
101.
Which of the following creates natural levees?
A. Backswamps
B. Successive floods
C. Drained lakes
D. Manmade ponds
102.
What develops when the area behind a levee is not drained?
103.
When a stream enters an ocean or lake it can form a delta. What kind of velocity
is the stream moving with?
A. Increasing
B. Decreasing
C. Constant
D. It completely stops
104.
True or false: Yazoo tributaries are perpendicular to the main channel.
105.
True or false: the controlling factors of turbulent and laminar flow are velocity of
flow and the roughness of channel bottom.
106.
What is the area above the water table where openings are in the material are
filled with air?
A. Zone of saturation
B. Water table
C. Confined aquifer
D. Zone of aeration
107.
What is the water table and what does it separate?
108.
What is the difference between a confined and unconfined aquifer?
109.
What is the difference between an influent stream and effluent stream?
110.
What is an area of soil or rock below the level of the water table where all the
voids are filled with water?
A. Zone of saturation
B. Zone of aeration
C. Aquifer
D. Water table
111.
What is a karst and what are examples of a karst?
112.
All of the following are features of karsts, except for:
A. Sink Holes
B. Caves
C. Aquifers
D. Disappearing streams
113.
A conical shaped depression surrounding a well which is caused when the well
pumps water and cannot move toward the well fast enough to maintain a flat water
table is?
A. Effluent stream
B. Cone of depression
C. Cone of impression
D. Artesian well
114.
What is the difference between recharge and discharge?
115.
A well that flows under pressure generated by a confined aquifer is?
116.
What happens when contaminants flow?
117.
A region in the subsurface which holds and transmits water in a quantity that has
the quality to be useful:
A. Aquifer
B. Aquitard
C. Aquiclude
D. Water Table
118.
Layers of the subsurface that drastically slow down the transmission of water:
A. Aquifer
B. Aquitard
C. Aquiclude
D. Water Table
119.
Define porosity and permeability:
120.
Layers of the subsurface which prevent the transmission of water:
A. Aquifer
B. Aquitard
C. Aquiclude
D. Water Table
Additional Questions:
An earthquake has hit downtown Los Angeles in California, a heavily populated city. The
Richter scale recorded the earthquake to be a 6.5 in magnitude. What scale would you use to
measure the destruction and would the destruction be high or low?
Draw Seismic waves being recorded on a Seismograph during an earthquake. Label the type of
waves and `which one’s would be the fastest and most destructive.