10 free sample questions with answers and explanations. See how you'd score on the real CLEP exam.
According to sociologist George Simmel, which of the following is the most significant consequence of adding a third member to a previously two-person group?
Explanation
Simmel showed the triad is more stable than the dyad because coalitions can form, but the unique one-on-one intimacy of the dyad is diluted.
A college student simultaneously holds the statuses of daughter, employee, and varsity athlete. When the demands of her coach conflict with the demands of her employer, she experiences which of the following?
Explanation
Role conflict arises when obligations of TWO DIFFERENT statuses clash. Role strain is tension within a single status's roles.
Howard Becker argued that deviance is not an inherent quality of an act but rather the result of society's reaction to it. This perspective is most closely associated with which theory of deviance?
Explanation
Becker's labeling theory holds that deviance is created by societal reaction and the label applied, not the act itself. Strain theory focuses on blocked goals.
A charismatic religious leader attracts a mass following through her perceived extraordinary personal gifts and divine inspiration. After her death, her disciples establish formal rules, offices, and written doctrines to preserve her teachings. Weber called this transformation of charismatic authority into a stable institutional form:
Explanation
Weber's 'routinization of charisma' describes how personal charismatic authority is institutionalized after a leader's death; bureaucratization "Bureaucratization" is related but not the specific Weberian term.
The sociological perspective that holds that power in modern democratic societies is distributed among many competing interest groups, so that no single group dominates political decision-making, is known as:
Explanation
Pluralism holds that power is dispersed across competing groups; the power-elite model "The power-elite model" is its direct theoretical rival, arguing the opposite.
C. Wright Mills argued in 'The Power Elite' (1956) that political decisions in the United States are effectively controlled by a small, interlocking group drawn from which three institutional spheres?
Explanation
Mills identified the military chiefs, corporate executives, and top political leaders as the three overlapping elites; option "The judiciary, the legislature, and the executive" describes branches of government only.
A newly elected senator derives her right to make binding laws from the written constitution and established legal procedures of her country. According to Max Weber, this is an example of which type of legitimate authority?
Explanation
Rational-legal authority rests on codified rules and offices, not personal qualities (charismatic) or custom (traditional).
Émile Durkheim argued that the most fundamental distinction in religious life is between the sacred and the profane. Which of the following BEST illustrates the concept of the 'sacred' as Durkheim defined it?
Explanation
Durkheim defined sacred as set-apart objects inspiring awe/collective reverence. A flag ritually venerated by a community fits perfectly; the others are mundane/profane.
An economy in which the government owns and controls major industries while allowing some private ownership of smaller businesses is best described as a:
Explanation
A mixed economy combines state control of key sectors with private enterprise; a pure command/socialist economy has no private ownership of production.
In Marxist theory, the term 'means of production' refers to which of the following?
Explanation
Marx defined means of production as physical inputs — land, tools, factories — whose ownership determines class position; not labor division or market exchange.