Instructor Resource
Duck, Communication in Everyday Life: The Basic Course Edition With Public
Speaking, 3e
SAGE Publishing, 2021
Chapter 1: An Overview of Communication
Test Bank
Multiple Choice
1. The perspective that “communication is interaction” is limited because it fails to
______.
a. account for the correct timing of a message
b. account for the exchange of information between two or more individuals
c. account for the exchange of information between a sender and receiver
d. fully capture what happens when people communicate
2. The perspective of “communication as transaction” is more accurate than other
perspectives because it accounts for the ______.
a. correct timing of a message
b. exchange of information between two or more individuals
c. creation of shared meanings and understandings through communication
d. intention to send a message
3. The use of symbols in communication is complicated because they ______.
a. have only one meaning
b. have multiple meanings
c. are not affected by culture and context
d. are not representational
4. Which of the following is true of symbols and communication?
Instructor Resource
Duck, Communication in Everyday Life: The Basic Course Edition With Public
Speaking, 3e
SAGE Publishing, 2021
a. Symbols have the potential for only one meaning.
b. Symbols are used to deflect meaning.
c. The meaning applied to symbols may change.
d. Symbols preclude meaning.
5. Communication is presentational because it is ______.
a. never neutral
b. always objective
c. not always effective
d. always effective
6. Frames can enhance communication by helping to ______.
a. open up unlimited meanings
b. determine outcomes
c. draw a boundary around the conversation
d. completely terminate communication interactions
7. One characteristic of framing in communication is that ______.
a. every part of the message must be explicitly stated
b. frames pull attention toward certain things and away from others
c. every part of the message can be ignored
d. not every part of the message can be ignored
8. The means through which a message is conveyed is the ______.
Instructor Resource
Duck, Communication in Everyday Life: The Basic Course Edition With Public
Speaking, 3e
SAGE Publishing, 2021
a. message
b. module
c. method
d. medium
9. Communication frames are based in part on a person’s perspectives of ______.
a. situations
b. relationships with others
c. neither situations nor relationships with others
d. both situations and relationships with others
10. All of the following are examples of contexts that can affect the meaning(s) a single
symbol or message can have except ______context.
a. physical
b. symbolic
c. relational
d. situational
11. One characteristic of communication is that it is cultural. Which statement is NOT
true?
a. Different cultures make different assumptions.
b. Each time you talk to someone, from your culture or another, you are taking
knowledge for granted.
c. Cultural expectations are only reinforced when someone violates them.
d. You perform and enact your culture through communication.
12. All of the following are examples of communication as interaction, except ______.
a. you leave a message on a friend’s voice mail, and he returns the call.
b. you leave a note for your mother, and she responds by sending you a text.
c. you send a message in a bottle to a friend, and she sends you an e-mail saying she
got it.
d. you send a text to your boss letting him know you’re going to be late for work.
13. Which statement is true of the constitutive approach to communication?
a. It is the way in which symbols take on meaning in a social context or society.
b. It is an arbitrary representation of ideas, people, relationships, cultures, genders, and
so forth.
c. It brings into existence something that has not been there before.
d. It can be used to study all communicative activity.
14. Family members using certain words or phrases that have particular shared
meaning as they are used over time is an example of what concept?
a. Communication frame
b. Social construction
c. Constitutive approach to communication
d. Communication as interaction
15. All of the following are representations of a symbol, except ______.
a. smoke
b. a place
c. ideas
d. relationships
16. Which is NOT true of a symbol?
a. It is an arbitrary representation.
b. There is a direct causal connection between a symbol and what it represents.
c. A symbol can be either verbal or nonverbal.
d. A symbol can be different in different cultures.
17. Which statement is true of social construction?
a. It is an arbitrary representation of ideas, people, relationships, cultures, genders, and
so forth.
b. It brings into existence something that has not been there before.
c. It can be used to study all communicative activity.
d. It is the way in which symbols take on meaning in a social context or society as they
are used over time.
18. The constitutive approach to communication contends that communication does not
just construct meaning, but it is through communication that ______ is/are created.
a. relationships
b. cultures
c. genders and ethnicities
d. realities
e. all of the above
19. Each time you talk to someone, from your culture or another, you are doing all of the
following, except ______.
a. taking knowledge for granted
b. doing what your culture expects
c. not reinforcing cultural expectations
Instructor Resource
Duck, Communication in Everyday Life: The Basic Course Edition With Public
Speaking, 3e
SAGE Publishing, 2021
d. doing, performing, and enacting your culture
20. All of the following are one of the seven characteristics of communication studied in
this chapter, except ______.
a. communication involves frames.
b. communication is chemistry.
c. communication is cultural.
d. communication is relational.
21. The following may be said about relationships and communication:
a. Communication affects relationships, but relationships cannot affect communication.
b. Relationships between people most often are always openly expressed.
c. Relationships are communication interactions only between two people.
d. Relationships are assumed each time you communicate with someone.
22. In an encounter, which of the following issues are being negotiated?
a. Gender, status, power, and politeness
b. Gender and status only
c. Power and politeness only
d. Gender and politeness only
23. Phrases can have different meanings depending on the time and place they are
communicated. Which context below focuses on the time and/or place in which a
message is communicated?
a. Physical context
Instructor Resource
Duck, Communication in Everyday Life: The Basic Course Edition With Public
Speaking, 3e
SAGE Publishing, 2021
b. Symbolic context
c. Relational context
d. Situational context
24. Every message indicates how the sender of a message and the receiver of that
message are socially and personally related. This characteristic implies that
communication is ______.
a. symbolic
b. cultural
c. relational
d. contextual
25. Communication as ______ is the most advanced view of communication.
a. transaction
b. action
c. interaction
d. variation
26. Terry sent a text message to Janice that said, “Meet me in the library at: 1:00.”
However, Janice did not see or read the message that was received. This is an example
of communication as ______.
a. transaction
b. action
c. interaction
d. variation
27. When communication messages constitute something above and beyond the
symbols being exchanged, this is an example of communication as ______.
a. transaction
b. action
c. interaction
d. variation
Multiple Response
1. SELECT ALL THAT APPLY. A symbol can be a ______.
a. word
b. mark
c. sound
d. logo
2. SELECT ALL THAT APPLY. Cultural expectations determine when you ______.
a. greet someone with a kiss or a handshake
b. make or maintain eye contact
c. stand at a distance from someone during a conversation
d. take turns while talking
3. SELECT ALL THAT APPLY. What are ways in which group decision making is
accomplished?
a. Groupthink
b. Agenda setting
c. Solution evaluations
d. Relationships among group members
4. SELECT ALL THAT APPLY. Most interactions between romantic partners consist of
more than holding hands and gazing into one another’s eyes. Which are examples of
everyday interactions that might also take place?
a. What to eat
b. What bills need paying
c. What is the source of a foul odor?
d. Coordinating schedules
5. SELECT ALL THAT APPLY. Which medium/media will impact the meaning of a
message?
a. Text
b. Social networking sites
c. A note placed on someone’s windshield
d. Smoke signals
6. SELECT ALL THAT APPLY. Which of the following includes examples of Internet
activism?
a. Hacking into secure computer systems
b. Hashtagged motto at the end of a post
c. Printed pamphlets
d. Online fundraiser for a particular cause
7. SELECT ALL THAT APPLY. Many conversations between close friends are “framed”
by ______.
a. conversations
Instructor Resource
Duck, Communication in Everyday Life: The Basic Course Edition With Public
Speaking, 3e
SAGE Publishing, 2021
b. history
c. previous experiences
True/False
1. Context has no effect on the meaning of a communicated message.
2. Any type of communication you ever participate in has a relationship assumed
underneath it.
3. Communication is explained as transmitting information from Person A to Person B.
4. The perspective of “communication as action” defines communication as occurring
only if information is exchanged between two or more individuals.
5. Symbols are always constant in meaning from one cultural context to the next.
6. We tend to speak differently with different people, such as with parents or our boss.
7. Everyday conversations create and maintain various aspects of our lives.
8. Gender issues are neither negotiated through nor associated with communication.
9. A communicative “frame” pulls our attention toward certain things and away from
others.
10. Meaning develops when groups of people use particular symbols.
11. Presentational communication describes facts or conveys information, while
representational communication gives one person’s particular version of the facts.
12. Social construction involves the way in which symbols take on meaning in a social
context as they are used over time.
13. The representational and presentational nature of communication is limited to
interactions between people.
14. Communication is interesting and worthy of study because something magical and
extra happens in the process beyond the mere exchange of messages.
15. Frames are basic forms of knowledge that provide a definition of a scenario.
16. Communication is the definitive use of symbols—influenced, guided, and
understood in the context of relationships.
17. Not all communication is characterized by the use of symbols.