All Free Sociology MCQs with Answers
Every Sociology question in the bank, across all chapters, each with the correct answer and a written explanation. Free and unlimited, with no account needed.
1,258 questions · page 12 of 63
- A. community service
- B. imprisonment
- C. electronic tagging
- D. curfews
Explanation: Community service can be restorative when it requires the offender to make a constructive contribution to the community affected by the…
Correct answer: community service- A. white-collar crime
- B. victimless crime
- C. corporate crime
- D. organized crime
Explanation: Corporate crime is illegal conduct committed by a company or by people acting on its behalf in the course of business, including breaches…
Correct answer: corporate crime- A. restorative justice
- B. deterrent sentencingAccess Government Careers
- C. target hardening
- D. zero tolerance
Explanation: Broken-windows theory argues that visible disorder encourages more serious offending, so it is associated with strict enforcement of minor…
Correct answer: zero tolerance- A. labelling theory
- B. control theory
- C. functionalist theory
- D. conflict theory
Explanation: Labelling theory treats deviance as a result of social interaction: authorities or groups apply a deviant label to particular people or…
Correct answer: labelling theory- A. international drug dealing via email
- B. the vandalizing of virtual environments
- C. The global trade in online pornography
- D. theft of goods sold via online action websitesRun Background Checks
Explanation: Vandalizing virtual environments is a genuinely new form of offending that depends on digital technology, making it a third-generation…
Correct answer: the vandalizing of virtual environments- A. the new criminology
- B. broken windows theory
- C. situational crime prevention
- D. deviance reduction theory
Explanation: Situational crime prevention reduces opportunities for offending through measures such as CCTV, neighbourhood surveillance, immobilizers…
Correct answer: situational crime prevention- A. deviant behavior is behavior that is labelled so by the law
- B. deviant behavior is that which causes public offence
- C. deviant behavior is that labelled by the perpetrators
- D. deviant behavior is behavior that people so label
Explanation: Howard Becker defined deviance as behaviour that people successfully label as deviant, making social reaction central to the concept.
Correct answer: deviant behavior is behavior that people so label- A. deviance is normally sanctioned by lawTake Sociology Courses
- B. deviance and crime very often overlap
- C. the concept of deviance can be applied to individuals and groups
- D. the concept of 'deviance' is much broader than 'crime'
Explanation: Deviance is broader than crime because it includes violations of social norms that are not necessarily illegal, such as unusual dress or…
Correct answer: deviance is normally sanctioned by lawTake Sociology Courses- A. restitution
- B. radical non-intervention
- C. legalization
- D. decriminalization
- E. retribution
Explanation: Radical non-intervention advises authorities to avoid unnecessary intervention, because official reactions can create stigma and reinforce…
Correct answer: radical non-intervention- A. 1950s
- B. 1980s
- C. 1940s
- D. 1960s
- E. 1970s
Explanation: Labelling theory became prominent in the 1960s through writers such as Howard Becker, Edwin Lemert, and Erving Goffman.
Correct answer: 1960s- A. conformity
- B. corporate crime
- C. Psychologically-based crime
- D. lower-class crime
- E. white-collar crime
Explanation: Social control theory asks why most people conform rather than offend, arguing that strong bonds to family, school, work, and society…
Correct answer: conformity- A. Social Control theory
- B. Lower Class Focal Value theory
- C. Anomie theory
- D. Social Process theory
- E. Strain theory
Explanation: Lower Class Focal Value theory explains crime through distinctive subcultural values or focal concerns that may support deviant conduct.
Correct answer: Lower Class Focal Value theory- A. ritualists
- B. ret realists
- C. rebels
- D. innovators
- E. conformists
Explanation: Merton calls people who accept conventional success goals but use illegitimate means to achieve them innovators.
Correct answer: innovators- A. pre-natal nutrition
- B. hormones
- C. genetic abnormalities
- D. adolescence
- E. early childhood
Explanation: Psychological positivism links later conformist or criminal belief systems to experiences in early childhood, when personality and basic…
Correct answer: early childhood235. Conflict theory's primary suggestion for reducing crime and deviance involves the_____________?
- A. Substantial reduction of economic inequality
- B. Subordination of the agents of social control
- C. redefinition of acts that are currently defined as criminal
- D. amelioration of social welfare activities
- E. repression of lower-class gang activities
Explanation: Conflict theory connects crime to unequal power and economic conditions, so it proposes reducing substantial economic inequality as a…
Correct answer: Substantial reduction of economic inequality- A. Differential Association
- B. Conflict
- C. Positivism
- D. Social Control
- E. Functionalism
Explanation: Conflict theory asks who has the power to make rules and define some behaviours as deviant while protecting others from criminalisation.
Correct answer: Conflict- A. age-specific support
- B. formal social control
- C. internalization of norms
- D. informal social control
- E. positivism
Explanation: Peer approval operates through informal social control because friends and peers reward or disapprove of behaviour without using official…
Correct answer: informal social control- A. Without a deal of grate variation
- B. Completely irrelevant
- C. totally in keeping with tradition
- D. Without a corresponding judgment
- E. inherently deviant
Explanation: Sociologists generally hold that no behaviour is inherently deviant; deviance depends on social rules and the reactions of others.
Correct answer: inherently deviant- A. it is a committed on a larger, often global, scale, and is well organized
- B. all of the above
- C. it can have far-reaching effects upon international relations
- D. it is associated with political conflict between states and their citizens
Explanation: Terrorism is typically organised across a broad, sometimes global scale and is tied to political conflict, with possible effects on…
Correct answer: all of the above- A. White collar crime
- B. none-criminal deviance
- C. organized crime
- D. global terrorism
Explanation: The Mafia is a structured criminal organisation involved in continuing illegal activities through coordination, hierarchy, and sometimes…
Correct answer: organized crime