Deck 9: Public Opinion and Political Socialization

Question 1

Opinion polls for the 2020 presidential election were affected by

A) Voter dishonesty
B) Late decisionmaking by voters
C) Pollster incompetence
D) a and b

Answer 1

a and b

Question 2

What are the four dimensions of public opinion?

A) Direction, stability, salience, intensity
B) Direction salience, margin of error, sampling frame
C) Sampling frame, stability, salience, direction
D) Salience, direction, intensity, sampling frame

Answer 2

Direction, stability, salience, intensity

Question 3

Rituals such as the pledge of allegiance are an example of what?

A) Public opinion
B) Salience
C) Socioeconomic indoctrination
D) Political socialization

Answer 3

Political socialization

Question 4

__________ is the sum of individual attitudes or beliefs about an issue or question.

A) Political opinion
B) Public opinion
C) Directional opinion
D) None of these

Question 5

Elected officials who view their job as becoming experts on the issues and making decisions that they believe are in the public's best interest regardless of what their constituents believe are called

A) Push pollers
B) Trustees
C) Delegates
D) Logrollers

Question 6

The ________ of public opinion refers to whether public opinion is positive or negative.

A) Stability
B) Intensity
C) Salience
D) Direction

Question 7

__________ refers to the prominence and visibility of an issue.

A) Stability
B) Intensity
C) Salience
D) Direction

Question 8

The majority of people who participate in politics are

A) Older, better educated, and more prosperous
B) Less confident their views will be taken into account by policy makers
C) Racially and ethnically diverse
D) Less trustful of the government and more moderate

Question 9

Opinions are typically based on all of the following EXCEPT

A) Rational analysis
B) Ideology
C) Socialization
D) Political culture

Question 10

All of the following are good questions to ask to measure the reliability and validity of a poll EXCEPT

A) What is the margin of error?
B) What was the question?
C) Did the poll ask the right people?
D) All of these are good questions.

Question 11

__________, or people with a strong interest in a particular issue, tend to be well informed about that particular policy area and capable of making sophisticated choices.

A) Political parties
B) Issue publics
C) Political elites
D) None of these

Question 12

A ________ deliberately feeds respondents misleading information or leading questions in an effort to push them into favoring a particular candidate or issue.

A) Biased poll
B) Push poll
C) Sway poll
D) Straw poll

Question 13

The _________ is the amount by which the sample responses are likely to differ from those of the population.

A) Sampling error
B) Margin of error
C) Both a and b
D) Neither a nor b

Question 14

The influence of family as an agent of political socialization tends to ______________ as one gets older.

A) Decline
B) Increase
C) Stay relatively constant
D) Disappear altogether

Question 15

Reference groups are groups that influence the attitudes of people who

A) Work in the reference section of the library
B) Are members of the group
C) Are not members of the group, but identify with the group anyway
D) Are opposed to the group's mission

Question 16

The "rally round the flag" response occurs after

A) International and military crises
B) Economic downturn
C) Social upheaval
D) None of these

Question 17

Reversals of opinion on social issues are

A) Rare
B) Common
C) Of no interest to scholars
D) Receive no attention from the news media

Question 18

Individual attitudes on the issue of abortion are relatively

A) Unstable
B) Stable
C) Uncertain
D) Directionless

Question 19

In a ___________, public officials are to make decisions based on their own expertise and judgment, and not just make decision based on the wishes and preferences of their constituents.

A) Delegate model of democracy
B) Political culture
C) Hyperdemocracy
D) Trustee model of democracy

Question 20

Polls based on nonrandom samples are often referred to as

A) Biased samples
B) Straw polls
C) Push polls
D) None of the above

Question 21

The element of ________ is the likelihood of changes in the direction of public opinion

A) Stability
B) Ideology
C) Intensity
D) Confidence level

Question 22

There is mounting evidence that mass political attitudes and behaviors are

A) Genetically influenced
B) Products of rational and reasoned thought
C) Largely independent of ideology
D) All of the above

Question 23

Why does government often seem so unresponsive to public opinion?

A) Public opinion is uniformed
B) Public opinion lacks stability and/or salience
C) Public opinion is divided
D) All of the above

Question 24

Which of the following is more likely to produce a reliable measure of public opinion?

A) Straw poll
B) Random sample
C) Non-random sample
D) Push poll

Question 25

A consistent set of values, attitudes, and beliefs about the appropriate role of government in society is called

A) Ideology
B) Political culture
C) Public opinion
D) Straw poll

Question 26

Major agents of political socialization include all of the following EXCEPT

A) Family
B) Labor unions
C) School
D) Peers

Question 27

Political participation may not be an accurate reflection of the will of the people because

A) not all people participate equally, so some interests are disproportionately represented in the political process.
B) poor people are so much more numerous than rich people that the interests of the wealthy get outvoted.
C) elected officials lie in order to get elected and do not respond to the will of the people once they are in office.
D) an increase in cynicism makes people more likely to vote.

Question 28

Using data based on twin studies, researchers found that some political beliefs and opinions could be attributed to

A) Environment
B) Genetics
C) Schools
D) Religion

Question 29

Translating public opinion into public policy is complicated because

A) Public opinion is often based on ignorance rather than knowledge of an issue.
B) Public opinion can change quickly
C) The process of arriving at policy decisions as well as the decisions themselves must meet public expectations
D) All of the above

Question 30

Which of the following would be a random sample in which we could determine the sampling error?

A) People shopping at a mall are chosen at random to be interviewed
B) People mail in their opinions on a form in a magazine
C) We take a sample in which every person in the nation has an equal chance of being selected to be interviewed.
D) All of the above would qualify as random samples

Question 31

The size of the margin of error in a random sample is determined by

A) The size of the population from which the sample is taken
B) The size of the random sample
C) The number of questions asked in the survey
D) All of the above

Question 32

A poll finds 52% of voters supporting candidate A, and 48% supporting candidate B, with a 3 percent margin of error. Given this information, we can say that

A) More voters support candidate A than candidate B.
B) More voters support candidate B than candidate A.
C) Candidate A is more likely to win the race than candidate B.
D) The range of opinion makes it difficult to assess who has more support.

Question 33

All of the following can potentially undermine the validity of poll EXCEPT

A) A non-random sample
B) A large sample size
C) Question wording
D) The ordering of the questions

Question 34

With respect to public opinion, intensity refers to

A) The like or dislike of the issue
B) The strength of feeling about an issue
C) How lasting the public's opinion is on an issue
D) The number of people who support the issue

Question 35

"Political socialization" refers to

A) The deterministic influence of socioeconomic status in shaping one's political views
B) The charisma of some candidates for public office
C) The process by which one develops opinions and attitudes about politics
D) Mind control techniques used by totalitarian regimes

Question 36

The term "ideology" refers to

A) The study of political ideas
B) The prevailing opinion regarding an issue
C) An artificial distinction between the two major parties
D) A coherent set of attitudes about politics and government

Question 37

The ________ is the chance , measured in percent, that the results of a survey will fall within the boundaries set by the margin of error.

A) Salience
B) Intensity
C) Direction
D) Confidence level

Question 38

_______ refers to the attitudes of people with large measures of political influence or expertise.

A) Public opinion
B) Elite opinion
C) Issue public
D) None of the above

Question 39

The same problems with political polling occurred in both the 2016 and 2020 elections.

Question 40

Polling problems are a new phenomenon related to the rise of social media.

Question 41

Public opinion on controversial issues tends to fluctuate according to who occupies the office of the Presidency.

Question 42

Public opinion is one measure of the will of the people.

Question 43

Most people believe public opinion should play no role in guiding government decision making.

Question 44

Opinions are typically the product of rational and knowledgeable analysis.

Question 45

Recent research suggests that there is a biological component to opinions, with people inheriting predispositions toward certain political beliefs.

Question 46

There is general agreement about the appropriate role of public opinion.

Question 47

Members of the National Rifle Association would be considered an "issue public."

Question 48

"Political culture" refers to societies in which interest in politics is high and most citizens participate in politics.

Question 49

Does public opinion really reflect the will of the people?

Question 50

Are there any political opinions you would be reluctant to share on a survey? Are you more likely to accurately share those opinions with a live interviewer over the telephone or through a more impersonal medium like an internet survey or a robo-call? Given your answers, what do you think is the best survey method to use if the objective is to get an accurate, representative sample?

Question 51

If issue attitudes are at least partially biologically influenced, does this make it harder to persuade someone to change their political opinion? Why or why not?