Chapter 2
Test Bank
Multiple Choice
1. National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden leaked his collection of classified
documents to journalist Glenn Greenwald because ______.
a. Snowden didn’t want anyone to know he was the source of the documents
b. Snowden wanted to have a responsible journalist cover the story, not just dump a large
collection of documents on an anonymous Web site.
c. Greenwald could be counted on to write the most sensationalistic stories based on the
information
d. it was very important to Snowden that he give the documents to a British reporter rather than
an American reporter.
2. Fears that media messages would have strong, direct effects on individuals grew out of
propaganda campaigns during which of the following conflicts?
a. the U.S. Civil War
b. World War I
c. the Vietnam War
d. the Persian Gulf War
3. Godwin’s Law argues that online discussions that go on long enough eventually ______.
a. die out for lack of interest
b. reach a reasonable conclusion based on a wide range of viewpoints
c. are reduced to threats of violence
d. end comparing people to Hitler or Nazis
4. Research on opinion leaders conducted in the 1940s provide an example of ______.
a. Secret 1—The media are essential components of our lives
b. Secret 3—Everything from the margin moves to the center
c. Secret 5—All media are social
d. Secret 7—There is no “they”
5. Which of the following is not a key principle of the critical/cultural model?
a. You can’t make sense out of ideas if you take them out of their historical context.
b. People want to see themselves as holding a majority opinion and will therefore remain silent if
they perceive that they hold a minority opinion.
c. Researchers cannot separate facts from the values attached to them and the circumstances from
which these facts emerged.
d. You can’t fool me. These are all principles of the critical/cultural model.
6. An important consequence of the critical/cultural model is that researchers pay more attention
to ______.
a. how meaning is created within society
b. the effect that watching television advertising has on children’s toy preferences
c. how the rise of mobile devices has changed how teens communicate with each other
d. how electronic documents differ from paper documents
7. Critical theory arose from a group of scholars known as the ______.
a. Marxist Group
b. Frankfurt School
c. Paris School
d. Feminist Group
8. A study that attempts to explain why a radio program about the death of an attractive young
woman is more popular with audiences than one about a male soldier who deserts his unit on the
battlefield would be an example of ______.
a. critical theory
b. structural/functionalism
c. uses and gratifications
d. two-step flow
9. Which of the following best describes the findings of the People’s Choice study from 1940?
a. Audiences receive strong, direct effects from media campaign messages.
b. Audiences are unaffected by media campaign messages.
c. Audiences are indirectly affected by media campaign messages.
d. Audiences actively use the media to construct their view of the world.
10. The critical/cultural model assumes which of the following?
a. Audiences receive strong, direct effects from media campaign messages.
b. Audiences are unaffected by media campaign messages.
c. Audiences are indirectly affected by media campaign messages.
d. Audiences actively use the media to construct their view of the world.
11. Correlation is accomplished by persuasive communication through which of the following?
a. editorializing
b. commentary
c. advertising
d. all of the above
12. The central change that Edward Snowden’s and WikiLeaks’ release of national security
documents represents is ______.
a. arresting people is easier than stopping the flow of information
b. messages can now move around the world easily, even when governments would like to
censor them
c. electronic documents are becoming more powerful that paper documents
d. all of the above
13. A media scholar is looking at why so many Americans are watching The Big Bang Theory on
television. What kind of effects is this scholar looking for?
a. message effects
b. media effects
c. ownership effects
d. active audience effects
14. A media scholar is trying to find out if children who watch Sesame Street do better in second
grade than children who watch Dora the Explorer. What kind of effects is he looking for?
a. message effects
b. media effects
c. ownership effects
d. active audience effects
15. A media scholar is trying to find out whether Internet or television political ads are more
persuasive. What kind of effects is he looking for?
a. message effects
b. media effects
c. ownership effects
d. active audience effects
16. A media scholar is trying to find out if the editorial focus of a newspaper changed after it was
purchased by a large media conglomerate. What kind of effects is he looking for?
a. message effects
b. media effects
c. ownership effects
d. active audience effects
17. Each cast of American Idol becomes famous after appearing on the show for a season. This is
an example of the ______ function of the media.
a. surveillance/status conferral
b. correlation of different elements in society
c. socialization and transmission of culture
d. entertainment
18. A study that looks whether press coverage of budget deficits made audiences talk more about
government spending would be an example of which of the following?
a. agenda setting
b. uses and gratifications theory
c. social learning
d. spiral of silence
19. A study that looks at why teenagers like to go to horror movies like Hostel or Saw would be
an example of which of the following?
a. agenda setting
b. uses and gratifications theory
c. social learning
d. mean world syndrome
20. A study that looks at how children acquire new behaviors by watching movies on television
would be an example of which of the following?
a. uses and gratifications theory
b. symbolic interactionism
c. media logic
d. social learning
21. The documentary An Inconvenient Truth makes the case that we have a global warming
problem. Regardless of the merit of the arguments in the film, it has convinced many people that
there is a global warming problem and they will then act on that belief. You could explain this
using which of the following?
a. cultivation analysis
b. uses and gratifications theory
c. symbolic interactionism
d. media logic
22. A newspaper runs stories that suggest that most people in the country support cutting taxes.
After reading the stories, people who support raising taxes tend to keep quiet because they think
their neighbors all support tax cuts. This would be an example of which of the following?
a. agenda setting
b. spiral of silence
c. social learning
d. symbolic interactionism
23. When an activist group stages an event in a way that facilitates its being covered by the local
television station, they are making use of which of the following?
a. media logic
b. cultivation analysis
c. mean world syndrome
d. agenda setting
24. Martha watches quite a bit of television, including a lot of crime dramas. She believes that
the city she lives in has a much higher crime rate than it actually does. You could explain this
using which of the following?
a. uses and gratifications theory
b. mean world syndrome
c. social learning
d. media logic
25. The theoretical orientation that argues that watching large amounts of television can create a
worldview that is at odds with reality is which of the following?
a. uses and gratifications theory
b. social learning
c. symbolic interactionism
d. cultivation analysis
True/Flase
1. National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden had to smuggle all of the secret
documents he stole out of the office in a series of boxes filled with paper files.
2. Canadian economist Harold Innis argues that any given medium has a bias of lasting a long
time or of being easy to distribute.
3. Cable news channels are as likely to report about crime affecting poor African American
women and girls as they are about crime affecting wealthy white women and girls.
4. Prior to the nineteenth century, most people in Europe and North America lived in
homogeneous communities.
5. The direct effects model of media effects presumes that messages have a direct and predictable
effect on audience members exposed to the message.
6. The indirect effects model recognizes that people will react differently to media messages
because they have different backgrounds, needs, attitudes, and values.
7. Current research supports the fears media critics had in the World War I era of powerful,
direct effects of the mass media.
8. The People’s Choice study found that voters use information from the media instead of
information from family members to make up their minds during elections.
9. The critical/cultural approach to mass communication research looks at how meaning is
created in society.
10. Research explaining why the disappearances of wealthy white women generates more news
stories than the disappearances of poor women of color would be within the direct effects model.
11. People who need to talk about the news at work are no more likely to learn from the media
than are people who watch the news to be entertained.
12. The channel used to transmit a message can change the meaning of the message.
13. Media theorist Marshall McLuhan argued for “medium neutrality”—the medium used to
communicate did not change how a message is received.
14. Joshua Meyrowitz argues that a major effect of transmitting news through print is
segregating audiences by education, age, class, and gender.
15. Psychographics means using psychics to predict which candidates will be elected.
16. Journalists tend to be somewhat more liberal politically than the public at large.
17. The people who own the news media tend to be somewhat more conservative politically than
the public at large.
Essay
1. Who are opinion leaders?
2. Provide an example of a cognitive effect of the media.
3. Briefly describe the difference between an attitudinal effect and a behavioral effect of the
media.
4. Provide an example of a psychological effect of the media.
5. When we learn about the world through the media, we are engaging in ______.
6. When starlets are famous for being famous, they have often had their reputations built by the
______ function of the media.
7. The mass media engage in status conferral in a number of ways. List two.
8. What is agenda setting?
9. According to uses and gratifications theory, why would a young man watch a romantic
comedy movie that he wasn’t interested in with his girlfriend?
10. The following statement, “If men define situations as real, they are real in their
consequences,” is a central principle of ______.
11. What is the mean world syndrome?
12. In a brief essay, define the spiral of silence theory, explain where it came from, and provide
an example of how it might work in the world of social media.
13. In a brief essay, explain what media logic is and provide an example of it in use.
14. In a brief essay, use the ideas from critical theory to explain why critics were concerned
about the lack of toys featuring Rey, the female lead in the movie Star Wars: The Force
Awakens.
