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When he was writing The Spirit and the Flesh: Sexual Diversity in American Indian Culture, the ethnographer Walter Williams was always very open about his own sexual orientation because he believed that being open with the people he was studying was the only way to establish a trusting and sharing interaction with them. What was Williams concerned with?


A) validity
B) thick description
C) reactivity
D) rapport
E) replicability

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You are about to do a series of interviews about drug abuse and academic performance. In order to make people feel more comfortable, you tell them that these interviews are about student satisfaction with the university and have them sign a form showing that they've willingly agreed to participate. You have the informed consent of your research subjects.

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You're conducting research on violence in the media. If you're trying to decide whether "violence" includes words as well as actions, in what part of the research process are you engaged?


A) forming a hypothesis
B) analyzing the data
C) defining the variables
D) disseminating your research findings
E) reviewing the literature

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What is the primary goal of comparative and historical research methods?


A) to enhance the validity of experiments
B) to understand relationships between parts of society in different times and different places
C) to uncover issues that have been neglected by mainstream social research
D) to select participants who are very similar so that the independent variable can be isolated
E) to produce data that can be used to encourage social change

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Why should sociologists generally follow the steps of the scientific method or approach?

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Answers to this question should address ...

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A paradigm shift is a major break in the assumptions that are used to understand the world. For social scientists, what causes a paradigm shift?


A) the study of history
B) new data forces a new way of looking at the world
C) religion and theology
D) increased awareness of the current paradigm
E) objective knowledge of the world

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You're doing a research project on the effects of contemporary media. If your hypothesis is that "watching violence on television causes an increase in violent behavior," then what are your variables?


A) violence on television and violent behavior
B) number of violent acts and age of television watchers
C) watching television, violence on television, and violent behavior
D) violent behavior
E) violence in the media

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The anthropologist Ruth Behar traveled to San Luis Potosí to learn more about the everyday lives of Mexican women. Instead, she ended up conducting one very long, very intensive interview with a woman named Esperanza and wrote a book based upon more than a year of interview data. Which disadvantage of the interview methodology does this book highlight?


A) Face-to-face interviewing is time consuming, and interviews are rarely used with large numbers of people. Thus, their representativeness is sometimes questionable.
B) Respondents are not always forthcoming or truthful. Sometimes they are difficult to talk to, and at other times they may try too hard to be helpful.
C) Interviews generally lack qualitative data that might better capture the social reality the researcher wishes to examine.
D) Interviews, although able to describe messages inherent in the media, do not illuminate how such messages are interpreted.
E) Interviews sometimes distance the researcher from the messy realities of the social world.

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In her ethnography Number Our Days, Barbara Myerhoff investigated the daily lives of elderly Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe who lived in Los Angeles. Most of her work took place at a senior citizen center. Before she could even start this research, Myerhoff had to convince the director of the center that it was a legitimate and worthwhile project, a process known as:


A) gaining access.
B) participant observation.
C) fieldnotes.
D) thick description.
E) sampling.

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Which of the following parts of a research project is always free of bias?


A) identifying the project
B) selecting the sample
C) wording the questions
D) analyzing the data
E) none of the above

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What is the scientific method or approach?


A) the use of statistics to analyze numerical data
B) the study of scientific processes
C) the standard procedure for acquiring and verifying empirical knowledge
D) the use of technology to understand the physical world
E) the study of nature

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For many years, researchers struggled to find a biological explanation for sexual orientation. However the vast majority of studies have focused on gay men and excluded lesbians, which might lead sociologists to question the ____________ of such research.


A) commercial uses
B) objectivity
C) reflexivity
D) reliability
E) validity

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Sometimes survey researchers reject randomness and instead use weighting techniques to construct a sample. How is a weighted sample different from a random one?


A) The weighted sample does not target any specific group within the population.
B) The weighted sample more closely resembles the larger population.
C) A weighted sample excludes some members of the population.
D) A weighted sample draws from a larger target population rather than a random one.
E) A weighted sample is only used when a researcher needs to ask weighted questions.

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What are the goals of ethnography?


A) to explain ethnic differences using qualitative methods
B) to develop quantitative data sets that allow researchers to discover correlations
C) to conduct interviews with people who have very different ways of life
D) to describe activities sociologists observe and to understand what those activities mean to the people involved
E) to develop ethics and standards for sociological research

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Lili is conducting a sociological research study on the underground music scene. She has just finished collecting data for the study. What is the next step Lili should take in the sociological research or approach or method?


A) disseminate findings
B) analyze data
C) form a hypothesis; give operational definitions to variables
D) choose a research design or method
E) identify a problem or ask a question

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Which of the following is NOT a disadvantage of using interviews to conduct social research?


A) Interviewees are allowed to speak in their own words.
B) Interviewees are not always truthful.
C) Interviewees can be difficult to talk to.
D) Interviews are time consuming.
E) It can be difficult to generalize from interviews because the sample size is usually small.

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When writing questions for a survey, researchers must avoid all of the following EXCEPT:


A) leading questions.
B) double-barreled questions.
C) negative questions.
D) bias.
E) open-ended questions.

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According to researchers who study online social networks, how are online networks different from social networks established through traditional, real-life, face-to-face contact?


A) Online networks aren't different.
B) There tends to be greater racial diversity in our social networks online.
C) Family members are almost never part of our social networks online.
D) In face-to-face-based networks, we have far more shallow relationships.
E) Traditional social networks don't confer as many advantages in terms of employment and contacts as online networks do.

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In recent years, sociologists who study deviance have learned that they can measure the quantities of narcotics consumed by a community by testing its sewage before treatment. What part of the research process would the sociologists be carrying out when they visit the sewage treatment plant?


A) analyzing data
B) disseminating the findings
C) forming a hypothesis
D) collecting data
E) developing an operational definition

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Even if you pick your method carefully, you will still have to sacrifice some types of information in order to acquire others.

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