Deck 5: Social Interaction and Everyday Life in the Age of the Internet

Question 1

Erving Goffman and other theorists who focus on social interaction often use the analogy of:

A) theater and drama
B) football and stadiums
C) swimming and pools
D) basketball and gyms

Answer 1

A

Question 2

In studying social interaction, when an "opening" occurs:

A) civil inattention is discarded
B) action moves from back to front regions
C) roles shift to allow for status expansion
D) civil attention replaces regionalization

Answer 2

A

Question 3

If your instructor were to ask if you cleaned up your room before leaving the house, she would be acting outside of her:

A) role
B) class status
C) personal space
D) marker

Answer 3

A

Question 4

Nonverbal communication is:

A) the exchange of information through facial expressions and movements of the body
B) unnecessary in the zone of public distance
C) a useful form of communication only in front region situations
D) a useful form of communication only in back region situations

Question 5

Paul Ekman and colleagues devised a method for studying nonverbal communication called:

A) zones of personal space
B) facial action coding system
C) conversation analysis
D) ethnomethodology

Question 6

Audience segregation allows people to:

A) simultaneously engage in focused and unfocused interaction
B) reconcile their role in one part of life with their role in another part of their social world
C) "strike the same pose" in different contexts
D) efficiently blur roles and break down boundaries between statuses

Question 7

What is one reason sociologists are concerned with civil inattention, which appears to be a rather unconscious behavior?

A) If an individual implies to another person that he is not suspicious of the other's behavior, there is no reason to be hostile toward the other person whose social life is allowed to proceed in an orderly fashion.
B) Allowing sociologists to see how people openly express their emotions toward others gives them vital information in nonverbal communication.
C) Seeing individual unconscious behavior lends sociologists great insight into mob and riot mentality.
D) Determining the function of civil inattention allows sociologists to understand the conforming nature of interaction.

Question 8

Charles Darwin believed that basic human emotional expressions:

A) are learned and vary among cultures
B) are innate and the same in all human beings
C) vary widely, depending on geography
D) were irrelevant to scientific study

Question 9

Two people walking on a city sidewalk quickly glance at each other and then look away as they pass. Erving Goffman called this type of interaction:

A) compulsion of proximity
B) focused interaction
C) civil inattention
D) uncivil behavior

Question 10

Why do people use impression management?

A) They are unaware of personal space.
B) They are sensitive about how others see them.
C) They are unaware they are social actors.
D) They want to avoid civil inattention.

Question 11

An "opening" is necessary for what Erving Goffman calls a(n):

A) unfocused interaction
B) scene
C) search procedure
D) encounter

Question 12

The purpose of response cries, according to Erving Goffman, is to:

A) express the person's unconscious motivations
B) show others one's continued competence in daily routines
C) get others to feel sorry for one's failures
D) draw attention to oneself

Question 13

Erving Goffman refers to an instance of focused interaction as:

A) a response cry
B) unfocused interaction
C) civil inattention
D) an encounter

Question 14

A student drops a spoon on the floor as she carries her dish to the kitchen. As the spoon clatters loudly on the tile floor, she exclaims, "Ooooooh, sorry!" This is an example of a:

A) facial expression
B) personal space
C) slip of the tongue
D) response cry

Question 15

James Henslin and Mae Biggs explored impression management using the situation of medical pelvic exams. Each part of the pelvic exam was divided into distinct:

A) roles
B) statuses
C) scenes
D) acts

Question 16

Which of the following statements is true?

A) Infants have facial expressions similar to those of adults.
B) Certain gestures-a thumbs-up, for example-mean the same thing everywhere.
C) Basic facial expressions of emotion-a smile when happy, a frown when sad, for example-are different depending on geographical location.
D) There are six basic facial expressions that vary between cultures.

Question 17

In a total institution, as detailed in Erving Goffman's ethnographic account of a mental hospital in Washington, D.C., humans have very limited:

A) privacy and must adapt to the fact that their private spheres are limited
B) exposure to intimate sexual relationships and must explore these relationships publicly
C) interaction with their peers
D) time in public and must learn to create rich private lives

Question 18

Socially defined expectations of a person in a given social position are referred to as:

A) statuses
B) roles
C) markers
D) agency

Question 19

As a form of social interaction, the exchange of information and meaning through facial expressions, gestures, and movements of the body is called:

A) ethnomethodology
B) saving face
C) nonverbal communication
D) unfocused interaction

Question 20

A status message allows people who are participating in unfocused interaction to:

A) have less control over their unfocused interaction
B) have more control over how they are perceived
C) demonstrate how they perceive others
D) be distanced from how others perceive them

Question 21

What do your textbook authors mean when they state that the Internet rearranges space?

A) We can order furniture online.
B) The compulsion of proximity disappears.
C) We can now live in virtual reality.
D) We can interact with anyone, anywhere.

Question 22

According to Harold Garfinkel and ethnomethodology, people tend to get upset when minor conventions of talk are not followed. His explanation for this reaction is that:

A) people are rule followers and need to have the shared expectations of conversations
B) cultural assumptions cannot shape what is said and people are angered by attempts to change this
C) talk is so important to people that it can cause the audience to overreact
D) it is disturbing when people disrupt the stability and undermine the cultural assumptions about what is said and why

Question 23

Interactional vandalism illustrates the connection between micro-level interactions and the larger society because it:

A) removes traditional stigmas in social interaction
B) temporarily gives power to the person initiating the interaction
C) reflects larger race, class, and gender inequalities of power and status in society
D) counters traditional social power relationships

Question 24

What do your textbook authors mean when they state that the Internet alters our experience of time?

A) We can buy recreational drugs online.
B) We lose track of time as we surf the Internet.
C) Electronic communication is almost immediate.
D) We no longer notice the slight delay when opening up web pages.

Question 25

The pioneering sociologist who developed microsociology and emphasized the importance of the "seemingly trivial" was:

A) Karl Marx
B) Max Weber
C) Émile Durkheim
D) Erving Goffman

Question 26

The reading, research, and other preparation that your professor did to get ready for the lecture in your sociology class were done in what Erving Goffman refers to as:

A) personal distance
B) social distance
C) front regions
D) back regions

Question 27

Interactional vandalism can be defined as a situation in which a:

A) subordinate person breaks the tacit rules of interaction that are valued by the more powerful person
B) powerful person breaks the tacit rules of interaction that denigrate the subordinate
C) subordinate person defaces or destroys property valued by the more powerful person
D) powerful person breaks the tacit rules of interaction and interacts with a subordinate as an equal

Question 28

Harold Garfinkel conducted experiments in which students were encouraged to pursue the precise meaning of general or casual comments. The intent was to uncover the _________ that people use to structure and organize everyday conversation.

A) formal grammar
B) deceptive tactics
C) background expectancies
D) facial expressions

Question 29

Which of the following statements concerning microsociology is true?

A) Social behavior is not constrained by forces such as roles, norms, and shared expectations.
B) Individuals have agency.
C) Reality is fixed and static.
D) A person's background, interests, or motivations do not shape their perception of reality.

Question 30

According to Edward T. Hall, which zone is most acceptable during an encounter with most of your friends and closer acquaintances?

A) intimate distance
B) public distance
C) social distance
D) personal distance

Question 31

A sex worker repeatedly tries to initiate conversation with a businessman despite his obvious unwillingness to respond. This is an example of:

A) ethnomethodology
B) civil inattention
C) response cries
D) interactional vandalism

Question 32

An ethnomethodologist would likely study the:

A) conversations among roommates in a college dormitory
B) connection between American dependence on foreign oil and the war in Iraq
C) voting patterns of urban and rural communities
D) bureaucratic structures in the education system

Question 33

When your professor is delivering a lecture, she usually displays professional behavior. Erving Goffman refers to this behavior as characteristic of:

A) ethnos
B) interactional vandalism
C) front regions
D) back regions

Question 34

Harold Garfinkel developed "ethnomethodology," which is the:

A) nonintrusive recognition of others, done more or less unconsciously
B) process by which we act and react to others around us
C) study of folk or lay methods people use to make sense of what others say and do
D) manner of communication that uses only gestures, no words

Question 35

Sometimes a person will smile, but an observer notes that the person's eyes look sad. Erving Goffman would say the sad eyes are part of the expression the person:

A) gives
B) gives off
C) gets
D) devoices

Question 36

The zoning of our activities is strongly influenced by clock time in:

A) hunting and gathering societies
B) agrarian societies
C) traditional civilizations
D) industrialized societies

Question 37

When sociologists analyze the contexts of social interaction, it is often helpful to look at how people move through:

A) gendered and nongendered role arenas
B) dominant and subordinate regions
C) zones of time and space
D) verbal and nonverbal domains

Question 38

Research by Duneier and Molotch shows that a fundamental requirement for urban civility is:

A) constant subjective conversational analysis
B) personal space realignment
C) negotiating smooth "openings" and "closings"
D) time-space regionalization

Question 39

The scenario in which students sleep in their bedrooms from 2:00 A.M. to 9:00 A.M., rush to a 9:30 A.M. class at the university, grab a quick lunch at the cafeteria, nap on the grass at about 3:30 P.M., return to class at 4:00 P.M., collapse in bed at 6:30 P.M., study in a library study room from 8:00 P.M. to 10:00 P.M., and go to a club from 10:15 P.M. to 1:30 A.M. illustrates the sociological concept of:

A) compulsion of proximity
B) regionalization
C) unfocused interaction
D) impression management

Question 40

The technique used by Mitch Duneier and Harvey Molotch to compare interactions between street people and passersby in New York City was:

A) survey analysis
B) comparative historical analysis
C) life history
D) conversation analysis

Question 41

What does Elijah Anderson call racially and ethnically diverse spaces that offer "a respite from the lingering tensions of urban life as well as an opportunity for diverse peoples to come together"?

A) cosmopolitan canopy
B) ethnocentric canopy
C) "ghetto downtown"
D) street

Question 42

According to urban sociologist Jeffrey Lane, what was a characteristic of interaction among teenagers in Harlem?

A) Girls and boys were more in danger when using social media.
B) There was little pressure on young women to objectify their bodies online.
C) The possibility of fake pages was unknown to boys and girls.
D) Law enforcement used profiles designed to mimic girls in the neighborhood to monitor and gather intelligence on boys of interest.

Question 43

When a student texts his friends with familiar abbreviations and acronyms but e-mails his professors with carefully written and edited messages, he is using the media for:

A) impression management
B) unfocused interaction
C) nonverbal communication
D) regionalization

Question 44

Who is more likely to own a smartphone in the United States?

A) someone with less than a high school education
B) a high school graduate
C) someone with some college education
D) a college graduate

Question 45

A researcher's study of the text messages exchanged among a group of friends can be referred to as:

A) an experiment
B) a historical analysis
C) a comparative analysis
D) conversation analysis

Question 46

Research conducted by Kevin Lewis found that:

A) white men received the most initial messages
B) the tendency to initiate contact within one's own race was strongest among whites
C) women tended to show greatest interest in men with a college education-"no more and no less"
D) men tended to show greatest interest in women with more than a college education

Question 47

According to Elijah Anderson, the sight of "public mothering" is a cue that indicates a space is what?

A) feminist
B) civil
C) diverse
D) poor

Question 48

According to urban sociologist Jeffrey Lane, what gender difference exists among teenagers in Harlem?

A) Boys were more visible and acted more dominant toward girls on the sidewalk than online.
B) Boys were more visible and in control online than girls.
C) Gender norms of interaction were reversed online.
D) There was more pressure on boys to objectify their bodies online than on girls.

Question 49

Some claim that our rapid advances in communication technologies are creating a "devoiced" society, which suggests that there is a decrease in:

A) direct interaction
B) indirection interaction
C) personal isolation
D) communication of all types

Question 50

In research by Elijah Anderson, time of day and activity were important cues because they could help people assess whether a stranger "passed inspection" and was considered to be:

A) "street"
B) safe
C) powerful
D) "entho"

Question 51

Which of the following is an example of interactional vandalism?

A) Groups attack store owners following a false arrest of a local resident.
B) Police repeatedly hit a driver whose car had a broken taillight.
C) Students vandalize campus or community property following a football victory.
D) A man comments on the appearance of a woman passing by, and she ignores him.

Question 52

The requirement on Facebook that people must send a request and have it accepted to be a "friend" is one way that social media allows the user to employ:

A) background expectancies
B) civil inattention
C) interactional vandalism
D) audience segregation

Question 53

When we look at the micro and macro connections that shape social issues such as the harassment of women on the street, we see that the:

A) solution must be addressed at the individual level by the people involved in the time and space of the incident
B) problem must be accepted as part of the gendered structure of the society
C) solution must address the larger underlying issues, such as gender inequality
D) problem must be analyzed from both the psychological and sociological levels

Question 54

Maria has two e-mail accounts, two cell phone numbers, and two social media accounts. One set of accounts she uses just for communication with her employer and her professors. By doing this, Maria is using the different media accounts to help to demarcate:

A) different scenes
B) front and back regions
C) zones of personal space
D) civil inattention

Question 55

Which country has the highest percentage of adults who own smartphones?

A) Germany
B) China
C) South Korea
D) United States

Question 56

Which of the following statements concerning online dating is true?

A) Few people who meet potential partners online have gone out on a date.
B) Most 18- to 24-year-olds have used a mobile dating app or website.
C) Many apps provide strong evidence that "homogamy" is no longer pervasive in U.S. society.
D) Studies show that apps provide evidence of "hypergamy."

Question 57

The use of the Internet, e-mail, chat rooms, and social networking sites such as Facebook:

A) has not changed the way sociologists study interaction and everyday life
B) adds a new and different dimension to the study of everyday life
C) allows sociologists to study nonverbal cues in a technological environment
D) has had an unarguably negative effect on social interaction

Question 58

Elijah Anderson's study (1990) of everyday life in two adjacent urban neighborhoods showed that tensions in social interaction are often based on the:

A) deviant personalities of individuals involved
B) stereotypes about the presumed statuses of the individuals involved
C) conversation between those involved
D) assumptions about gendered overlays

Question 59

Elijah Anderson would most likely characterize a _________ as a cosmopolitan canopy.

A) private school
B) state fair
C) corner store
D) courthouse

Question 60

Jane likes to log on anonymously to a Taylor Swift fan site and post deliberately provocative items. This behavior is known as:

A) trolling
B) a response cry
C) a search procedure
D) acting "street"

Question 61

The research by Deirdre Boden and Harvey Molotch (1994) concludes that copresence fosters intimacy and trust in part because people:

A) can see one another's eyes-the "windows of the soul"
B) can see whether the person matches his or her online persona
C) can avoid interactional vandalism
D) do not need to interact with that person again and so are freer

Question 62

Erving Goffman and other social interactionists brought to sociology the idea that humans possess a self that is fragile and vulnerable to embarrassment at every turn.

Question 63

The Internet is an exciting tool that facilitates communication between people. A latent advantage to electronic communication is that it:

A) enhances the expression of emotion
B) decreases misinterpretation
C) masks a person's membership in a traditionally disadvantaged group
D) builds more intimacy and trust than face-to-face communication

Question 64

MATCHING
a. Preparing for the presentation of one's social role
b. Communication between individuals based on facial expression or bodily gesture rather than on language
c. The social identity an individual has in a given group or society
d. The process whereby individuals in the same physical setting glance at each other and quickly look away to indicate awareness of each other but not intrusiveness
e. The social honor or prestige that a particular group is accorded by other members of a society
f. The expected behaviors of people occupying particular social positions
Status

Question 65

MATCHING
a. Preparing for the presentation of one's social role
b. Communication between individuals based on facial expression or bodily gesture rather than on language
c. The social identity an individual has in a given group or society
d. The process whereby individuals in the same physical setting glance at each other and quickly look away to indicate awareness of each other but not intrusiveness
e. The social honor or prestige that a particular group is accorded by other members of a society
f. The expected behaviors of people occupying particular social positions
Nonverbal communication

Question 66

What is the Facial Action Coding System? How has this system been used to study emotions? What evidence using this system suggests that the facial expression of emotions is innate? Is this evidence compelling? Your answer should be one paragraph in length.

Question 67

Christine Miranda conducted research about people using iPods on subways. What did she find? What do her findings suggest about people who use iPods in public? Your answer should be one paragraph in length.

Question 68

MATCHING
a. Preparing for the presentation of one's social role
b. Communication between individuals based on facial expression or bodily gesture rather than on language
c. The social identity an individual has in a given group or society
d. The process whereby individuals in the same physical setting glance at each other and quickly look away to indicate awareness of each other but not intrusiveness
e. The social honor or prestige that a particular group is accorded by other members of a society
f. The expected behaviors of people occupying particular social positions
Civil inattention

Question 69

One of the ways in which electronic media changes impression management is that:

A) there is no ability to separate front and back regions
B) audience segregation is not possible
C) nonverbal language plays much less of a part, if any, in many communications
D) people no longer can manage others' reactions

Question 70

Women are more likely than men to make the first move on online dating sites.

Question 71

A college campus is a total institution.

Question 72

Helga and Enid talk every day on the phone; send letters, e-mails, and gifts; and often chat online. Lately, they have been planning their next vacation together; despite their daily contact, they still miss each other. This is an example of which concept?

A) focused interaction
B) compulsion of proximity
C) impression management
D) social status

Question 73

Basic facial expressions of emotion-a smile when happy, a frown when sad, for example-are different depending on geographical location.

Question 74

Because of the Internet, powerful people are less able to segregate their audiences.

Question 75

MATCHING
a. Preparing for the presentation of one's social role
b. Communication between individuals based on facial expression or bodily gesture rather than on language
c. The social identity an individual has in a given group or society
d. The process whereby individuals in the same physical setting glance at each other and quickly look away to indicate awareness of each other but not intrusiveness
e. The social honor or prestige that a particular group is accorded by other members of a society
f. The expected behaviors of people occupying particular social positions
Social position

Question 76

Students vandalizing campus property following a football victory is an example of interactional vandalism.

Question 77

MATCHING
a. Preparing for the presentation of one's social role
b. Communication between individuals based on facial expression or bodily gesture rather than on language
c. The social identity an individual has in a given group or society
d. The process whereby individuals in the same physical setting glance at each other and quickly look away to indicate awareness of each other but not intrusiveness
e. The social honor or prestige that a particular group is accorded by other members of a society
f. The expected behaviors of people occupying particular social positions
Role

Question 78

Deirdre Boden and Harvey Molotch refer to the desire for copresence as:

A) the compulsion of proximity
B) rearrangement of space
C) regionalization
D) impression management

Question 79

MATCHING
a. Preparing for the presentation of one's social role
b. Communication between individuals based on facial expression or bodily gesture rather than on language
c. The social identity an individual has in a given group or society
d. The process whereby individuals in the same physical setting glance at each other and quickly look away to indicate awareness of each other but not intrusiveness
e. The social honor or prestige that a particular group is accorded by other members of a society
f. The expected behaviors of people occupying particular social positions
Impression management

Question 80

A student who sends a photograph of himself drinking with a suggestive message to his boss can be considered to be engaging in an electronic form of:

A) catfishing
B) regionalization
C) audience segregation
D) interactional vandalism