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Question 1

An 'open' society is one that:

a) grants every member equal status

b) does not have any official secrets in its government

c) has permissive attitudes towards sexual behaviour

d) allows people to move between levels of the hierarchy

Question 2

The 'absolute' poverty line is drawn to show:

a) the most extreme level of poverty that is found in a society

b) the estimated minimum level of income needed for subsistence

c) households that are poor, relative to the norms and values of their culture

d) the areas of a city in which poverty is concentrated

Question 3

Murray thought that the 'underclass' consisted of people who:

a) formed an inferior 'race' with low levels of intelligence

b) lived morally unsound lives of crime and squalor

c) were too reliant upon welfare benefits

d) all of the above

Question 4

The functionalist theory of inequality suggests that:

a) high rewards and incentives ensure that the most skilled individuals will take the most important social positions

b) inequality is inevitable and we are born into poverty or wealth

c) there are no social functions of inequality, so it should be eradicated

d) the idea of a meritocracy is a dangerous ideology

Question 5

The term 'assets' refers to:

a) the culturally valued commodities and standards of living that make the poor feel relatively deprived

b) the flow of money a person receives from their salary or wage

c) a stock of economic resources, including land, shares and bank deposits

d) the 'slices' of the population who own differing amounts of wealth

Question 6

Booth's (1901) study revealed that the percentage of people in London who were living in poverty was:

a) 30.7%

b) 27.5%

c) 18.6%

d) 33.2%

Question 7

The term inter-generational mobility refers to:

a) movement into a different occupational category over a person's lifetime

b) movement into different occupational categories between generations

c) movement into a higher occupational category

d) movement into an occupation that generates a lower income

Question 8

There was a growth in income inequality in the 1980s because:

a) rates of income tax increased equally for all occupational groups

b) there were more professional jobs available but not enough people to fill them

c) the price of consumer goods rose at a higher rate than earnings

d) growing unemployment made more people dependent on welfare benefits

Question 9

Which of these was not one of Townsend's (1979) indicators of relative deprivation?

a) lacking exclusive use of a bath or shower

b) living in housing with serious structural defects

c) buying fewer than twenty DVDs in the previous year

d) going without a week's holiday in the previous year

Question 10

The term feminization of poverty refers to:

a) the critical deconstruction of 'poverty' by feminist theorists

b) women's increased chances of being in poverty, due to low pay and greater welfare dependency

c) the way in which managing a budget and avoiding poverty tends to be a woman's responsibility within the home

d) the disproportionate number of female sociologists who do research on poverty

Oxford University Press, Online Resource Centre, Chapter 18.

Chapter 18

Instructions