Practice Test: COMM 305 Chapters 1-6

Matching skip

Short Answer skip

1. congruence
   
2. dependent variable
   
3. information
   
4. 5 standards for judging an objective theory- explanation of data
   
5. strange loop
   

Multiple Choice skip

1. critique of symbolic interactionism
   1. overstatement, issues of clarity and human nature
   2. the match between an individual's inner feelings and outer display
   3. the linguistic process by which group members develop a sense of community or closeness; cohesiveness, unity, solidarity
   4. the tendency for our expectations to evoke responses that confirm what we originally anticipated
2. ethical imperative
   1. a good theory is as simple as possible
   2. a good theory explains an event of behavior; brings clarity to a jumbled situation; synthesizes data; focuses attention; explains "why?"
   3. grant others that occur in your construction the same autonomy you practice constructing them
   4. a "nounable"sequence of speech acts with a beginning and an end that are held together by story; an argument, interview, wedding, mediation
3. independent variable
   1. a research method that manipulates a variable in a tightly controlled situation in order to find out if it has the predicted effect
   2. an applied approach to knowledge; the philosophy that true understanding of an idea or situation has practical implications for action
   3. a rank order of the relative significance of contexts--episode, relationship, identity, and culture--that encompass a given story as an aid to interpretation
   4. variable that depends on other factors
   5. variable that stands alone and isn't changed by the other variables you are trying to measure; example: age
4. episode
   1. a good interpretive theory can be identified by the amount of support it generates within a community of scholars who are interested and knowledgeable about the same type of communication
   2. a "nounable"sequence of speech acts with a beginning and an end that are held together by story; an argument, interview, wedding, mediation
   3. a good theory is testable; must be stated in a way that it can be tested and disapproved if it is indeed wrong
   4. a research method that uses questionaires and interviews to collect self-reported data that reflects what respondents think, feel and intend to do
   5. a good theory brings people's values into the open; theorist must acknowledge, identify, or unmask the ideology behind the message under scrutiny
5. Coordinated Management of Meaning (CMM)
   1. entertainment businesses that reproduce the dominant idealogy of a culture and distract people from recognizing unjust distribution of power within society (film, tv, music)
   2. the art of using all available means of persuasion, focusing upon lines of argument, organization of ideas, language use, and delivery in public speaking
   3. a predisposition to respond, composed of beliefs, feelings and intended actions
   4. epitomizes the scientific or objective perspective; cause-effect relationships; truths discovered through observation
   5. persons-in-conversation co-construct their own social realities and are simultaneously shaped by the worlds they create

True or False skip

1. five standards for judging an interpretive theory- new understanding of people
   interpretive scholarship is good when it offers fresh insight into the human condition

   True   False

2. symbolic convergence
   the linguistic process by which group members develop a sense of community or closeness; cohesiveness, unity, solidarity

   True   False

3. theory
   1. the control of language to perpetuate power imbalances. 2. the role of mass media in dulling sensitivity to repression. 3. blind reliance on the scientific method and uncritical acceptance of empirical findings

   True   False

4. culture industries
   Humans act toward people or things on the basis of the meanings they assign to those people or things

   True   False

5. I
   a good theory is useful; goal of social science is to help people have control over their daily lives

   True   False