Sociology A185
Exam #2 Study Guide
Exam Information:
You will have 1 hour and 20 minutes to complete the exam. Bring a scantron form #882 and a #2 pencil.
The exam is worth a total of 50 points, and it will consist of 40 multiple choice and true/false questions (each is
worth 1 point) and 2 short answer questions (each worth 5 points).
Material covered:
 Textbook Chapters 3 (assigned pages) and 4
 All lectures/PowerPoint’s/Articles
 All Films
Topics covered by Chapter/Page #’s/Lecture
Chapter 3- Pgs 70-78: Racial and Ethnic Inequality
 What is race? What is ethnicity? What is the difference between race and ethnicity?
 Which major theorist saw inequality as being based strictly upon one’s relationship to the means of
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production in society (economy)? Which social theorist understood inequality to be more complex and
based upon a number of social variables including wealth, power, and prestige?
What racial group makes up the majority of people who live in poverty in the United States?
What is a minority group?
According to sociologists, do we live in a color blind society?
Is race biological or a social construction? What is the idea of racial formation?
What is the difference between prejudice and discrimination? What is a stereotype?
What is Islamophobia?
What is institutional discrimination? What is racial stratification?
What racial group is most commonly targeted as victims of hate crimes?
What makes combating hate groups and their messages difficult for activist groups?
Chapter 3-Pgs 85-89: Problems in American Education
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What is education? What is schooling?
What percentage of adults in the world is illiterate?
Why was Thomas Jefferson an advocate and pioneer of the American Educational system?
What are the primary characteristics of the American educational system as discussed in lecture? Be
familiar with each.
How do the main sociological theories analyze the education system?
What is a self fulfilling prophecy? What is cultural imperialism?
What factors help to predict educational success and likelihood of an individual attending college?
What is wrong with the way that public schools are financed?
What is tracking, AKA ability grouping, and what negative effects can it have on students?
How are SAT scores linked to family income and race?
Chapter 3-Pgs 78-85: Gender Inequality
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What is the difference between sex and gender?
What is the gender wage gap?
What is patriarchy?
What are the main biological and social bases for gender roles?
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What is gender role socialization and what personality traits are typically identified as being masculine
and feminine? How does gender role socialization help to explain the gender wage gap?
What is sexism and what is gender stratification?
What is occupational segregation? What is a “pink collar job”? What is the “glass ceiling”?
What is feminism?
In what ways does gender stratification and male domination continue to exist in the United States and
throughout the world?
According to a 2011 study by the NCAVP, what has been occurring with murder rates and hate crimes
towards the LGBT community?
What is “Rape Culture” and how can we actively combat it?
Chapter 4-Problems of the Family
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Is there a natural state of the family? Why or why not?
What is the “crisis of the family” argument?
In what major ways has the family changed since the 1950’s?
Why do most families go bankrupt?
What is the “family decline” perspective? What is the “family change/family resiliency” perspective?
What is the human capital perspective and how does the U.S. compare to other countries in terms of
child care and rates of child poverty?
What is the subjective nature of social problems?
What does Robert Heiner describe as being the primary root of prejudice towards the homosexual
community? What are the culture wars?
What is the most common form of child abuse? What is the best predictor of child abuse and neglect?
How do many other industrialized nations, such as Finland and Sweden, work to reduce child poverty?
Short Answer Questions (2 will be chosen for the exam)
1. What is the difference between race and ethnicity? Is race a biological or social construction? Why?
Give at least one example to explain your answer?
2. What is Affirmative Action? Explain at least one argument made by those who support and those who
criticize Affirmative Action.
3. What does it mean that education is the “great equalizer”? Which sociological theory(s) is most likely to
argue that education is not the “great equalizer”? Please explain why this theory argues against this idea?
4. What is patriarchy? Does male domination continue to exist in American institutions? Please give at
least two examples to explain your answer?
5. Please identify two major trends that help describe the current state of the American family? What
macro level factors help explain these trends? (I.e.: what social institutions and social movements have
impacted and changed American families since the 1950’s).
6. What is the concept of “Rape Culture”? Please define this term and give at least one example to explain.
How can individuals work to fight against this concept in their daily lives?
7. What is the difference between sex and gender? What is a socialization agent? Please give at least two
examples of socialization agents and how they impact ideas about gender?