79. __________ are issues that motivate particular segments of the
electorate to vote and on which the opposing candidate or party
is less popular.
Topic: Voting Choices
Learning Objective: LO 7.5: Analyze why people vote the way
they do in elections.
Page Reference: 220
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
Diiculty Level: Easy
80. In a recent Pew Research Center Global Attitudes Survey,
corruption was seen as a bigger problem for most people in
India, Nigeria, Japan, and Mexico than in __________, which
allows neither the free expression of public opinion nor free
elections.
Topic: Voting Choices
Learning Objective: LO 7.5: Analyze why people vote the way
they do in elections.
Page Reference: 219
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
Diiculty Level: Easy
81. Voters who cast their ballots in the 2014 election did not vote
for a president and therefore voted in a(n) _____________ election.
Topic: Participation: Translating Opinions into Action
Learning Objective: LO 7.4: Identify forms of political
participation, and assess the efect on voter turnout of
demographic, legal, and electioneering factors.
Page Reference: 213
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts
Diiculty Level: Moderate
82. As a group, African Americans vote ___________ than Caucasians,
although this is beginning to change.
231
Topic: Participation: Translating Opinions into Action
Learning Objective: LO 7.4: Identify forms of political
participation, and assess the efect on voter turnout of
demographic, legal, and electioneering factors.
Page Reference: 214
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts
Diiculty Level: Moderate
83. After passage of the Twenty-Sixth Amendment, which increased
the number of eligible voters by lowering the voting age to18,
voter turnout between 1968 and 1972 ___________.
Topic: Participation: Translating Opinions into Action
Learning Objective: LO 7.4: Identify forms of political
participation, and assess the efect on voter turnout of
demographic, legal, and electioneering factors.
Page Reference: 216
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts
Diiculty Level: Moderate
84. Because public opinion can change from day to day and even
from hour to hour, polls are really only __________ of opinion at a
particular point in time.
Topic: Public Opinion: Taking the Pulse of the People
Learning Objective: LO 7.2: Describe the key dimensions of
public opinion, how public opinion is measured, and the
relationship between public opinion and public policy.
Page Reference: 200
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts
Diiculty Level: Moderate
85. Conservatives who focus less on economics and more on
morality and lifestyle are known as __________.
Topic: Political Ideology and Attitudes Toward Government
Learning Objective: LO 7.3: Compare and contrast political
ideologies and evaluate the critiques of each ideology.
Page Reference: 205
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts
232
Diiculty Level: Moderate
86. __________ believe that people are the architects of their own
success or failure.
Topic: Political Ideology and Attitudes Toward Government
Learning Objective: LO 7.3: Compare and contrast political
ideologies and evaluate the critiques of each ideology.
Page Reference: 205
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts
Diiculty Level: Moderate
87. The United States compares favorably with other nations in
political interest and awareness, but for a variety of institutional
and political reasons, about ____________ percent of all eligible
citizens fail to vote.
Topic: Participation: Translating Opinions into Action
Learning Objective: LO 7.4: Identify forms of political
participation, and assess the efect on voter turnout of
demographic, legal, and electioneering factors.
Page Reference: 216
Skill Level: Remember the Facts
Diiculty Level: Easy
88. The fact that today’s Americans are not well informed about
politics is consistent with the conclusions of scholars who have
found that users of _________ “are no more knowledgeable about
politics (in general and about the ield of presidential
candidates) than are their counterparts and, in fact, seem to be
less so.”
Topic: Forming Political Opinions and Values
Learning Objective: LO 7.1: Identify the forces that create and
shape individuals’ political attitudes.
Page Reference: 195 – 196
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts
Diiculty Level: Moderate
233
Short Answer Questions
89. What is political socialization?
1. Deine political socialization as the process by which we
develop our political attitudes, values, and beliefs.
2. Discuss efects of family, schools, mass media,
friends/peer groups, religion, and ethnicity.
Topic: Forming Political Opinions and Values
Learning Objective: LO 7.1: Identify the forces that create and
shape individuals’ political attitudes.
Page Reference: 194 – 196
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts
Diiculty Level: Moderate
90. Deine conservatism as a political ideology in American politics.
1. Deine conservatism as a belief in private property
rights and free markets, and enhancing individual liberty
by keeping government small, especially the national
government, while supporting a strong national defense.
2. Discuss that conservatives take a pessimistic view of
human nature and believe that a primary task of
government is to ensure order, irm laws, and strict moral
codes. Conservatives also believe that people are the
architects of their own success or failure.
Topic: Political Ideology and Attitudes Toward Government
Learning Objective: LO 7.3: Compare and contrast political
ideologies and evaluate the critiques of each ideology.
Page Reference: 204 – 205
Skill Level: Understand the Concepts
Diiculty Level: Moderate
91. Identify the agents of political socialization.
1. List the agents of political socialization, including
family, schools, peers/friends, mass media, and other
inluences.
2. Deine political socialization and/or describe how one or
more of these agents afects political socialization.
Topic: Forming Political Opinions and Values
Learning Objective: LO 7.1: Identify the forces that create and
shape individuals’ political attitudes.
1. Deine open-ended questions as questions that permit
respondents to answer using their own words rather than
choosing responses from set categories.
2. Discuss the negatives and/or positives associated with
asking open-ended questions. Negatives include the
acknowledgment that open-ended questions are harder to
record and compare, and positives include the
acknowledgment that they allow respondents to express
their views more fully and clearly.
Topic: Public Opinion: Taking the Pulse of the People
Learning Objective: LO 7.2: Describe the key dimensions of
public opinion, how public opinion is measured, and the
relationship between public opinion and public policy.
Page Reference: 200
Skill Level: Analyze It
Diiculty Level: Diicult
93. Explain what political scientist Austin Ranney meant by saying,
“Nonvoting is not a social disease.”
1. Note that voter turnout in the United States is lower
than in many other democratic governments and that
some people have expressed concern about this.
2. Explain Ranney’s statement as emphasizing the fact
that nonvoting is voluntary and that it is not problematic
235
as long as nonvoters closely resemble voters in their
policy views.
Topic: Participation: Translating Opinions into Action
Learning Objective: LO 7.4: Identify forms of political
participation, and assess the efect on voter turnout of
demographic, legal, and electioneering factors.
1. Deine socialism as a governmental system where some
of the means of production are controlled by the state and
where the state provides key human welfare services such
as health care and old age assistance. It also allows for
free markets in other activities.
2. Deine communism as a belief that the state owns
property in common for all people and where a single
political party that represents the working classes controls
the government.
3. Compare voting and elections and the levels of state
ownership. Identify China and Cuba v. Sweden or other
socialist example.
Topic: Political Ideology and Attitudes Toward Government
Learning Objective: LO 7.3: Compare and contrast political
ideologies and evaluate the critiques of each ideology.
Page Reference: 206 – 207
Skill Level: Analyze It
Diiculty Level: Diicult
95. Compare and contrast prospective issue voting with
retrospective issue voting. Apply this to the 2012 presidential
election.
1. Describe prospective issue voting as voting based on
what a candidate pledges to do in the future about an
issue if elected.
2. Describe retrospective issue voting as holding
incumbents, usually the president’s party, responsible for
their records on issues, such as the economy or foreign
policy.
3. Observe that Romney tried to appeal to prospective
issue voters by trying to sell his vision of America and his
policies, while he also appealed to retrospective voters,
saying Obama was a failure. Obama did the same, telling
prospective voters he just needed another four years to
turn it around; with retrospective voters he tried to both
lay the blame on the GOP and stated Romney would gut
social services.
Topic: Voting Choices
Learning Objective: LO 7.5: Analyze why people vote the way
they do in elections. Page Reference: 220 – 221
Skill Level: Apply What You Know
Diiculty Level: Diicult
96. Jared is a high school student. He belongs to the student council
and takes driver’s education classes once a week at the motor
club across town. Which group is likely to have more of an
impact on Jared’s political opinions and values: his student
council classmates or his driving-school classmates? Explain
your reasoning.
1. Choose either the student council classmates or driving-
school classmates as being the most inluential agent of
Jared’s political socialization.
2. Explain why the selected agent is more inluential.
3. Since the student council is more directly related to
politics and is embedded in the learning environment of
the school, it would appear to be the most inluential
agent.
Topic: Forming Political Opinions and Values
Learning Objective: LO 7.1: Identify the forces that create and
shape individuals’ political attitudes.
Page Reference: 195 – 196
Skill Level: Apply What You Know
Diiculty Level: Diicult
237
97. You consider your friend Rey to be part of the attentive public.
What sorts of things does Rey do on a daily basis to conform to
your belief that he follows public afairs fairly carefully?
1. Deine attentive public as citizens who follow public
afairs carefully.
2. Provide a few reasons why Rey is considered to be
attentive, such as voting behavior, reading habits,
previous personal discussions about politics, and external
factors like important agents of political socialization that
could potentially inluence Rey to be attentive.
Topic: Forming Political Opinions and Values
Learning Objective: LO 7.1: Identify the forces that create and
shape individuals’ political attitudes.
Page Reference: 198
Skill Level: Apply What You Know
Diiculty Level: Diicult
98. If the proportion of African American men in the general
population is 11 percent, what percentage of a randomly drawn
sample, if accurately drawn, will be African American men?
Explain your reasoning.
1. Note that if accurately drawn, a random sample should
include 11 percent of African American men.
2. Explain what a random sample is and the goal of
sampling, including a discussion about the population
universe that the sample is supposed to represent.
Answers may also include a discussion of proper sampling
techniques.
Topic: Public Opinion: Taking the Pulse of the People
Learning Objective: LO 7.2: Describe the key dimensions of
public opinion, how public opinion is measured, and the
relationship between public opinion and public policy.
Page Reference: 198 – 199
Skill Level: Apply What You Know
Diiculty Level: Diicult
99. Imagine two voters. One of these individuals has some college
education and is 23 years of age. The other has a master’s