Intro to Sociology - Review Sheet

Review Questions – Sociology 101 – SUNY Morrisville – Exam 1

Major Concepts to Review for Exam 1:

A. Introduction (from text Chapter 1 and class notes)

What is sociology and how do we define society?
What is the smallest "unit of analysis" in sociology?
What is "the self," as defined for sociologists?
How is "society" best defined?
What does it mean to have a "sociological imagination"?
What is a social institution? What does the acronym FREEP stand for?
What social forces were changing in European society in the 1800s?
Who are the thinkers (2F2G -- two in France, two in Germany ) who founded sociology as an "enlightenment science"?
Online Media - Sociological Imagination - What is the sociological imagination and who created the phrase?

B. Doing Social Science (text Chapter 2 and class notes)

What defines the scientific method?
What is a hypothesis? What is a theory?
What does the acronym NOTTUS stand for?
What are the differences between science, pseudoscience, non-science, and protoscience?
What are the typical methods of sociological research?
What is the difference between a research method's reliability and its validity?
Online Media - The Baloney Detection Kit: can you name at least three tools in the toolkit of baloney detection?

C. Cultural Sociology (text Chapter 3 and class notes)

What is one definition of culture?
What does it mean that "culture is to people as water is to fish"?
What is culture shock?
What are ethnocentricity and xenocentricity?
On the four components of culture:
... What are Symbols?
... What is Language?
... What are Values and Norms? How does this relate to beliefs?
... What are Artifacts?
What are the four "ways of knowing" (and establishing our beliefs)?
What is the difference between Material vs. Non-material culture? How are they connected? How does ripping up a dollar bill demonstrate this?
What is meant by the term "the globalization of culture"?
Online Media: Culture of Fear - what are the ways in which culture influences individuals, in terms of what they fear? How can we know what we sould legitimately fear and what's not worth worrying about? Should we always submit to our cultural constructions?