Deck 6: Public Opinion and the Media

Question 1

People who give answers that they believe interviewers want to hear are a problem for survey research because this can lead to social desirability bias.

Answer 1

True

Question 2

The equal time provision requires broadcasters to grant the same amount of on-air time on any non-news programming to every candidate running for office.

Answer 2

True

Question 3

Most people have political opinions that are similar to those of their parents.

Answer 3

True

Question 4

Some beliefs, such as party identification or ideology, can change quickly in response to external events.

Question 5

Internet polls are considered more credible than those that use random digit dialing, because Internet polls typically rely on a more advanced method of random sampling.

Question 6

Scholars have shown that even in the aftermath of major events, such as the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, people rarely revise their opinions on such issues as civil liberties.

Question 7

Although political scientists used to believe that the public had almost no meaningful opinions, they now believe that these opinions are based on a combination of principles and the information people have "on the top" of their heads.

Question 8

When we describe where someone falls on the conservative-moderate-liberal spectrum, we are referring to their:

A) party identification.
B) ideology.
C) policy mood.
D) latent opinion.
E) consideration.

Question 9

Early public research came to startling conclusions about public opinion, including:

A) many citizens had surprisingly high levels of factual information.
B) Americans were overwhelmingly conservative on almost every political issue.
C) Americans were overwhelmingly liberal on almost every political issue.
D) many citizens held inconsistent opinions.
E) older Americans were less informed about politics than most first-time voters.

Question 10

Sampling error in surveys increases when the survey questions are misleading.

Question 11

Public opinion is best defined as:

A) the amount of complexity about an individual's beliefs.
B) an opinion formed on the spot.
C) the process by which an individual learns about politics.
D) what the public thinks about government and politics.
E) a person's voting history.

Question 12

In the immediate wake of the Newtown shooting in January 2013, public opinion:

A) shifted in favor of the president.
B) shifted in favor of Congress.
C) remained unchanged.
D) shifted in favor of stricter gun control.
E) shifted in favor of less gun control.

Question 13

Support for gay marriage and/or civil unions has doubled in recent decades, at least in part because more survey respondents say that they know someone who is gay or lesbian.

Question 14

Early studies from the 1950s found overwhelming evidence that the public's political opinions were internally consistent and stable over time.

Question 15

Public opinion polls taken right after the Newtown shooting incident showed that Americans' views had not shifted much because of the incident.

Question 16

The United States has experienced a significant increase in ideological polarization in the past thirty years.

Question 17

Despite general dissatisfaction with the American health care system, there is no clear alternative that wins large amounts of support in public opinion surveys.

Question 18

The main reason that few people have consistent, stable beliefs is because they are forming opinions on the spot.

Question 19

An individual would be expressing what scholars call a "latent opinion" if asked for the first time to state a position on a complicated issue such as deficit reduction.

Question 20

George describes himself as a moderate. "Moderate" is George's:

A) ideology.
B) party identification.
C) policy mood.
D) latent opinion.
E) socialization.

Question 21

Which of the following best describes the contemporary political science perspective on public opinion?

A) Most people's political opinions are latent and are only formed when needed.
B) People only have strong and informed opinions on issues and subjects about economic issues.
C) Most people are not well-educated and should be discouraged from participating in politics until they learn more about American government.
D) Most people seek out information on political issues but often fail to comprehend what they read or hear.
E) People typically have well-formed opinions on most issues because of the abundance of news and political information available on the Internet.

Question 22

What is political socialization?

A) the process by which people become educated about liberal arts
B) attitudes toward social issues that come up in politics
C) the influence of politicians on people's views about society
D) the process by which an individual's political opinions are shaped by others
E) the amount of time people spend socializing in a political environment

Question 23

A(n) ________ is defined as a large number of people who change from identifying with one political party to identifying with the other.

A) partisan event
B) realignment
C) policy mood shift
D) ideology
E) political movement

Question 24

The fact that people are socialized into politics by their family and community means that:

A) they never modify their political principles.
B) their opinions almost never change.
C) very little thought goes into political opinions.
D) events early in life can affect one's sense of civic duty into adulthood.
E) other possible sources of influence, such as a high school civics class, have little effect.

Question 25

Public opinion research shows that broad beliefs such as what a person wants from government:

A) form early in life.
B) are typically unstable throughout life.
C) vary from the ages of 18 through 45 but then stabilize.
D) are difficult for researchers to measure, so little is known about them.
E) form later in life after age 30, when a person learns more about how government operates.

Question 26

Most people's political opinions and ideologies start forming:

A) during interactions with their parents and families.
B) through watching the mass media.
C) depending on the success of the president during their childhood.
D) through interactions with their teachers.
E) in conversations with their friends.

Question 27

What is a latent opinion?

A) a running balance of whether someone favors Republicans or Democrats
B) a description of whether a person is conservative or liberal
C) a long-held, durable belief
D) a view formed on the spot, as needed
E) an attitude about the proper level of government spending

Question 28

Which of the following is one of the "Big Five" personality traits that political psychologists believe may affect political socialization?

A) trustworthiness
B) agreeableness
C) happiness
D) socioeconomic status
E) pathology

Question 29

What is the most common relationship between parents and children when it comes to political ideology and partisanship?

A) They tend to have different political opinions because of their different generations.
B) They often disagree on the most controversial political issues because children tend to rebel against their parents.
C) They tend to share similar social views but not economic views because of changes in the economy over time.
D) They rarely agree on who to vote for in an election because young people do not have a strong political identity and can change their minds frequently.
E) They tend to share the same political ideology and partisanship; family is a strong and early force in political socialization.

Question 30

Research shows that growing up in a homogeneous community:

A) increases an adult's sense of civic duty.
B) decreases the likelihood of voting in an election.
C) increases support for Democrats.
D) increases support for Republicans.
E) makes people more evenhanded and moderate in their political attitudes.

Question 31

For most people, broad-based beliefs such as ideology and partisanship tend to:

A) remain stable over time.
B) shift depending on how a question is asked.
C) be latent opinions.
D) shift rapidly in response to questions.
E) change in response to popular presidents.

Question 32

What does it mean that people often form opinions on the spot?

A) Those opinions have essentially no meaning to the people who profess them.
B) People rely very heavily on their principles in formulating opinions.
C) People are sensitive to, and form their opinions based on, what they have recently seen or heard.
D) Their opinions are ill-informed and therefore are not counted in surveys.
E) We can only really tell what people believe by using sophisticated survey techniques.

Question 33

Things such as ideology, party identification, religious beliefs, and personal circumstances that people use to form a latent opinion are known as what?

A) policy mood
B) random sample
C) political socialization
D) partisan cue
E) consideration

Question 34

People tend to have similar political views as their parents:

A) because they are raised in a certain political environment.
B) because they share a genetic makeup with their parents.
C) both because they share a genetic makeup and because of the environment.
D) neither because of the environment nor genetic makeup.
E) there is no research on this area.

Question 35

What led to the development of a new theory of public opinion?

A) New research rejected the old premise that citizens' beliefs had to be internally consistent, stable, and based on a rationale that citizens could explain.
B) Research on surveys from the 1960s uncovered serious mathematical errors in earlier published research from the 1950s.
C) Increased educational opportunities changed how people thought about politics.
D) New survey technologies made public opinion research easier to conduct.
E) As candidates and politicians became more dependent on polls, additional research was needed to understand how best to measure public opinion.

Question 36

How does completing a civics class in high school impact political socialization?

A) It decreases the likelihood of a person protesting the actions of the government.
B) It increases support for democracy as a system of government.
C) It increases support for Democrats.
D) It increases support for Republicans.
E) It makes people more evenhanded and moderate in their political attitudes.

Question 37

Political scientist John Zaller showed that opinion changes generated by an event or some other piece of new information are more likely when:

A) the individual is a senior citizen and has more life experiences upon which to reflect.
B) the individual follows politics closely and knows that political issues can be complicated.
C) the individual is more highly educated and is used to considering different possibilities.
D) the individual is liberal and open-minded about different ideas and explanations.
E) the individual does not have a set of preexisting principles with which to interpret the event.

Question 38

Self-identified Republicans and Democrats judge government spending differently depending on whether a Republican or Democrat made the proposal. This demonstrates that:

A) poll results depend on the wording of the question.
B) most people form their opinions on the spot using a wide range of considerations.
C) random samples are hard to obtain.
D) researchers in the 1950s were correct in saying that there is no public opinion.
E) party leaders manipulate voters into supporting their ideas.

Question 39

Maria is asked to take a survey. One of the questions asks her about her views on the new head of the Federal Reserve. While Maria had not really thought about it before, she was able to come up with an answer. This is an example of a(n):

A) policy mood.
B) latent opinion.
C) political ideology.
D) partisan identification.
E) consideration.

Question 40

Political scientists became critical of public opinion research conducted in the 1950s because:

A) researchers in the 1950s lacked the tools to conduct a nationwide survey.
B) these early studies relied primarily on focus group research.
C) these early studies oversampled wealthy respondents because they were the most likely to own a telephone.
D) these early studies asked questions unrelated to politics.
E) researchers had an overly narrow view of what public opinion should be.

Question 41

Why are Internet polls unreliable?

A) There is often a liberal bias in these polls.
B) The sample is not random.
C) Computer users frequently hit the wrong key.
D) Many older Americans struggle to read from a computer screen and are prone to making errors in their responses.
E) Internet polling firms are new to the business and are more likely to make errors.

Question 42

Which of the following is a problem with mass surveys?

A) Random sampling produces sampling error in surveys.
B) Results are often inadvertently influenced by how questions are worded in the survey.
C) A typical mass survey of 1,000 people is simply not large enough to draw scientific conclusions about national public opinion.
D) Random digit dialing only reaches people with telephones, which biases the sample by overrepresenting the young.
E) Organizations that conduct polls do not have enough funding to do the surveys properly.

Question 43

Why is social desirability bias a problem for surveys?

A) It increases sampling error.
B) The results fail to account for the opinions of the poor.
C) The answers from respondents are not truthful.
D) It skews the results in favor of Republican candidates.
E) It skews the results in favor of Democratic candidates.

Question 44

A ________ is a subsection of a population chosen to participate in a survey through a selection process in which every member of the population has an equal chance of being chosen.

A) random sample
B) population
C) push poll
D) sampling error
E) target population

Question 45

According to Jacobs and Shapiro, politicians play an active role in creating public opinion by:

A) paying for push polls that will produce the results they want.
B) conducting town hall interviews with voters.
C) framing the way they put forward proposals to try and sway the public.
D) spending campaign money on television advertising.
E) only supporting those positions that polls show a majority of voters support.

Question 46

What is one way to get a good sample for a mass survey?

A) volunteered responses
B) random digit dialing
C) issue scales
D) push polls
E) convenience sampling

Question 47

In a survey about 9/11, pollsters found that the percentage of Americans aged 50 and over who believed that luck was the major reason there had not been another large attack since 9/11 was nearly double the percentage of Americans aged 18 to 29 who expressed the same belief. What is this an example of?

A) ideology
B) latent opinions
C) cohort effects
D) generational effects
E) considerations

Question 48

Which of the following is an example of cohort effects?

A) that individuals tend to share the same party identification as their parents
B) that people with high agreeableness are more likely to favor economic policies that help the disadvantaged
C) that, until the 1970s, relatively few native white southerners identified with the Republican Party
D) the failure of President Clinton to enact health care reform in 1994
E) the increasing ideological polarization in Congress

Question 49

Which of the following statements is true?

A) Sampling error can be eliminated from a mass survey.
B) Sampling error prevents any poll results from being taken seriously.
C) Sampling error is usually lower if the majority of the sample includes people with a four-year college degree.
D) Sampling error is usually lower if the majority of the sample includes people with strong political opinions.
E) Sampling error decreases as the size of the sample gets larger.

Question 50

In the 2012 election, Barack Obama's coalition consisted of:

A) the young, women, and ethnic and racial minorities.
B) the elderly, women, and southerners.
C) whites, men, and those with a college degree.
D) ethnic and racial minorities, men, and southerners.
E) the young, men, and ethnic and racial minorities.

Question 51

According to political scientists Donald Green, Bradley Palmquist, and Eric Schickler, how do group identities shape the decision someone makes when choosing between being a Republican or a Democrat?

A) Group identities often influence socioeconomic status, which affects partisanship.
B) Group identities affect one's self-esteem, which influences partisanship.
C) Group identities influence a person's trust in government, which affects partisanship.
D) A person picks the party that has more members from the groups with whom the person identifies.
E) Green, Palmquist, and Schickler argue that group identities are irrelevant to partisanship.

Question 52

The purpose of a focus group is to:

A) gain deep insights into why people hold the opinions they do.
B) ensure the accuracy of a mass survey.
C) eliminate sampling error.
D) provide a less expensive and less labor-intensive way to conduct a mass survey.
E) gain information about what "focused" people, who care deeply about politics, think about government policies and political candidates.

Question 53

A Pew Research Center survey of 1,500 randomly selected people, with a sampling error of +/-3 percent, showed that 52 percent of the respondents viewed the military effort in Afghanistan to be going well. Based on this result, what percentage of the population views the military effort in Afghanistan to be going well?

A) 52 percent
B) anywhere from 49 to 52 percent
C) anywhere from 52 to 55 percent
D) anywhere from 49 to 55 percent
E) sampling error and the question wording make it impossible to determine

Question 54

Which of the following is true about mass opinion surveys?

A) They have become more accurate over time because of the increase in Internet polls.
B) They have become so sophisticated that scientists have been able to eliminate any margin of error.
C) They are a powerful tool for measuring public opinion but should be interpreted carefully.
D) They should never be trusted because samples are almost always biased.
E) They cannot give an accurate picture of public opinion.

Question 55

A mass survey that seeks to understand public opinion toward President Obama's health care reform legislation would likely rely on a random sample of:

A) between 100,000 and 500,000 individuals.
B) between 1 million and 5 million individuals.
C) between 10,000 and 50,000 individuals.
D) between 50 and a few hundred individuals.
E) between a few hundred and several thousand individuals.

Question 56

A ________ is a way to measure public opinion by interviewing ________ population.

A) mass survey; the entire
B) mass survey; a large sample of the
C) focus group; the entire
D) focus group; a large sample of the
E) push poll; a random sample of the

Question 57

What does an issue scale ask people?

A) to choose which one of several policy options is closest to their views
B) how liberal or conservative they feel
C) why they are Republican or Democrat
D) what policies are most important to them
E) to identify their socioeconomic status

Question 58

Cohort effects exist because:

A) parents have such a strong influence on an individual's political opinions.
B) liberals and conservatives have significant political differences.
C) of an increasingly declining trust in American government and its elected officials.
D) there are genetic differences that divide those in different cohorts.
E) individuals learn about politics from the people around them.

Question 59

The purpose of a mass survey is to:

A) influence the public to support a particular candidate or policy.
B) measure the attitudes of a particular population.
C) instruct elected officials on the rules of Congress.
D) educate and inform the public about details of public policy.
E) predict early in the presidential campaign who will win the election and why.

Question 60

What kind of poll is used to affect, rather than measure, public opinion?

A) a push poll
B) a robo poll
C) a random sample poll
D) an exit poll
E) an opinion poll that relies on random digit dialing

Question 61

Why does a low level of trust in government matter?

A) It leads to high voter turnout.
B) It creates less competitive elections.
C) It can lead to elected officials pandering to their voters.
D) It allows experienced politicians to more easily manipulate less experienced politicians.
E) It makes it harder for elected officials to enact new policies.

Question 62

Which of the following best describes the liberal-conservative profile of the American public?

A) A majority of Americans describe themselves as conservative.
B) Most Americans are neither strongly conservative nor strongly liberal.
C) Most Americans lean toward being more liberal than conservative or moderate.
D) Americans are deeply divided, with most of them being either strongly liberal or strongly conservative.
E) Research on the liberal-conservative profile of the American public is inconsistent and has generally yielded inconclusive results.

Question 63

What is the nature of the consensus about issues like gun control and immigration?

A) There are a few specific solutions that everyone agrees on, but there is little consensus on general issues.
B) There is no consensus, either on broad issues or on specific solutions.
C) The public might appear to agree on what should be done, but this consensus breaks down when you start asking about specifics.
D) There is consensus on broad issues and specific solutions, but politicians will not risk angering interest groups to enact those solutions.
E) We do not have any good public opinion data on these issues.

Question 64

Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight.com and Simon Jackman of Pollster.com are known for what technique?

A) using Internet surveys to conduct their polls
B) creating an average of polls that is more accurate than any individual poll
C) combining academic research with polling techniques
D) conducting daily polls to get a more accurate reading
E) writing poll questions in such a way that they push people toward a certain answer

Question 65

Although Americans generally tend to dislike ________, they are relatively happy with ________.

A) their own representatives; the American political system
B) the U.S. Congress as a whole; their own representatives
C) both of their state's U.S. senators; their representative in the U.S. House
D) democracy; their own representatives
E) the president; the federal government

Question 66

What kind of government action suits the policy mood in Obama's second term?

A) more government action
B) less government action
C) about the same amount of government action as in recent years
D) government action at the federal level but not among the states
E) government action at the state level but not by the national government

Question 67

Survey results are most likely to be accurate when:

A) the survey is completed through a face-to-face interview.
B) the survey oversamples highly educated respondents.
C) the questions are based on a topic familiar to most Americans.
D) the questions are complex and convoluted.
E) the survey asks a hypothetical question that the respondent finds thought-provoking.

Question 68

When the geographical region that you grow up in affects which party you vote for, what is it called?

A) party identification
B) latent opinion
C) ideological polarization
D) political socialization
E) public opinion

Question 69

When many citizens take on strongly conservative or strongly liberal identities, it is called:

A) opinion formation.
B) political socialization.
C) latent opinion formation.
D) ideological polarization.
E) political maturity.

Question 70

By November 2013, polling on gun control had returned to its pre-Newtown levels. This shows us that:

A) other cues such as partisanship were more important than the Newtown incident in forming opinions.
B) Americans have inherently unstable opinions.
C) the media has an important influence on public opinion.
D) the original polls most likely did not involve a random sample.
E) gun control is an issue that we should not conduct polls about.

Question 71

What do opinions on Obamacare most closely align with?

A) a respondent's ideology and party identification
B) a respondent's race and ethnicity
C) whether a respondent previously had health care
D) the length of time a respondent spends watching the news
E) the level of education of a respondent

Question 72

When an issue or topic is salient, the survey respondent is:

A) likely to be confused by the question.
B) unlikely to answer the question or to take it seriously.
C) likely to express thoughtful but inaccurate opinions.
D) likely to express thoughtful and accurate opinions.
E) likely to answer the question but with a response that the respondent thinks the interviewer wants to hear.

Question 73

When policy mood leans in a liberal direction, how does government tend to respond?

A) by giving tax cuts and tax credits to corporations
B) by reducing civil liberties
C) by expanding the federal government's role in different programs
D) by cutting off foreign trade
E) by following policies designed to reduce deficit spending

Question 74

What is the current policy mood?

A) in favor of government action at the state level but not at the federal level
B) strongly in favor of government action because of continuing unemployment
C) Measures of the policy mood in the past few years have been very unstable.
D) generally neutral toward government action
E) Opposition to government action is as high as it has been since World War II.

Question 75

What was the policy mood during the late 1970s and early 1980s?

A) conservative
B) liberal
C) It alternated between conservative and liberal extremes.
D) moderate
E) It is impossible to determine because most polls have such high rates of sampling error.

Question 76

Americans' collective demands for government action on domestic policies are measured by:

A) ideological polarization.
B) policy mood.
C) trust in government.
D) partisanship.
E) the reelection rates of incumbent officeholders.

Question 77

The one issue that is almost always among the top three in surveys asking Americans about the most important problem facing the country is:

A) the economy.
B) foreign affairs.
C) abortion.
D) education.
E) campaign finance reform.

Question 78

Since the 1950s, trust in government has:

A) gone down significantly.
B) gone up significantly.
C) stayed the same.
D) decreased until the 1970s and then rebounded strongly.
E) increased until the 1970s and then dropped quickly.

Question 79

Most Americans' political judgments are based on latent opinions. What does that mean and what are latent opinions based upon? Provide an example of an issue in which most Americans would base their judgment on a latent opinion.

Question 80

What is public opinion? Explain how political scientists used to view the subject and how the new theory has changed our beliefs about public opinion. Has this new theory of public opinion done much to advance our understanding of politics and government? If so, how? If not, why?