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Karnataka II PUC Sociology (KSEAB) study materials
Karnataka II PUC Sociology (KSEAB) study resources

Karnataka II PUC Sociology (KSEAB) practice questions

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Question 1Nature, Scope and Significance of Sociology

Who is generally regarded as the founder of sociology for coining the term and proposing a positivist science of society?

  1. Auguste Comte Correct answer.
  2. Herbert Spencer
  3. Max Weber
  4. Emile Durkheim

Explanation

Comte coined the term sociology in the 1830s and argued that society should be studied with the methods of the natural sciences, an approach he called positivism. His work established the intellectual project that later sociologists developed.

Question 2Nature, Scope and Significance of Sociology

The sociological imagination, as described by C. Wright Mills, mainly involves connecting personal troubles with which of the following?

  1. Personal moral failings
  2. Individual genetic inheritance
  3. Supernatural explanations of fate
  4. Public issues and wider social structure Correct answer.

Explanation

Mills argued that the sociological imagination enables a person to see the link between biography and history, that is, between private troubles and public issues rooted in social structure. This capacity to shift from personal experience to structural analysis is the core of the idea.

Question 3Nature, Scope and Significance of Sociology

Sociology is described as a social science rather than a physical science primarily because it studies which of the following?

  1. Human social relationships and institutions Correct answer.
  2. The chemical composition of matter
  3. The behaviour of subatomic particles
  4. The classification of living organisms

Explanation

Sociology belongs to the social sciences because its subject matter is human social life, including groups, institutions and relationships. It shares systematic methods with other sciences but differs in the object of study.

Question 4Nature, Scope and Significance of Sociology

Which term refers to the tendency to judge another culture by the standards of one's own culture?

  1. Positivism
  2. Sociological imagination
  3. Cultural relativism
  4. Ethnocentrism Correct answer.

Explanation

Ethnocentrism is the practice of evaluating other cultures using the norms and values of one's own culture as the yardstick. Sociologists treat it as a bias that obstructs objective understanding of other societies.

Question 5Nature, Scope and Significance of Sociology

Which of the following best states the relationship between sociology and common sense?

  1. Sociology relies only on intuition and personal experience
  2. Sociology simply restates popular beliefs in academic language
  3. Sociology tests everyday assumptions systematically rather than accepting them Correct answer.
  4. Sociology rejects all everyday knowledge as worthless

Explanation

Common sense consists of taken-for-granted beliefs drawn from everyday experience, often inconsistent and unverified. Sociology subjects such beliefs to systematic evidence and theory, sometimes confirming but often challenging them.

Question 6Nature, Scope and Significance of Sociology

Which of the following is a practical or applied use of sociology in Karnataka's administration?

  1. Determining the atomic weight of elements
  2. Designing and evaluating welfare schemes using social survey data Correct answer.
  3. Classifying plant species by genus
  4. Measuring the speed of light in a vacuum

Explanation

Applied sociology uses survey research, evaluation studies and social analysis to inform policy and administration, such as assessing how welfare schemes reach intended beneficiaries. The other options describe tasks belonging to the natural sciences.

Question 7Nature, Scope and Significance of Sociology

Emile Durkheim's study of suicide is significant in sociology mainly because it demonstrated which of the following?

  1. That suicide is caused solely by individual mental illness
  2. That suicide rates vary with social integration and regulation Correct answer.
  3. That suicide cannot be studied statistically
  4. That suicide rates are identical in all societies

Explanation

Durkheim used official statistics to show that suicide rates differ systematically with levels of social integration and regulation, such as in egoistic and anomic forms. This established that a seemingly private act has social causes, validating sociological explanation.

Question 8Nature, Scope and Significance of Sociology

Max Weber's concept of verstehen directs the sociologist to do which of the following?

  1. Measure social facts with instruments used in physics
  2. Interpret the subjective meanings that actors attach to their actions Correct answer.
  3. Treat values as identical with empirical facts
  4. Derive social laws from biological heredity

Explanation

Verstehen means interpretive understanding of the meanings actors give to their own conduct, which Weber considered essential to explaining social action. It distinguishes his interpretive approach from purely external measurement of behaviour.

Question 9Nature, Scope and Significance of Sociology

A researcher studies how a Bengaluru neighbourhood's residents organise a waste-segregation campaign. Which feature marks this as a sociological rather than a purely journalistic account?

  1. It links the case to concepts and general patterns of collective action Correct answer.
  2. It reports only the personal opinions of the researcher
  3. It focuses exclusively on one individual's biography
  4. It describes the event without any conceptual framework

Explanation

Sociological analysis connects a particular case to broader concepts and patterns, such as collective action, norms and local institutions, and contributes to generalisable understanding. Mere description or personal opinion lacks this theoretical and comparative orientation.

Question 10Nature, Scope and Significance of Sociology

Which pair correctly matches a founder with a central contribution to early sociology?

  1. Herbert Spencer with the organic analogy of society Correct answer.
  2. Max Weber with the coining of the term sociology
  3. Auguste Comte with the study of anomie suicide rates
  4. Karl Marx with the theory of verstehen

Explanation

Spencer compared society to a living organism whose parts function together, an early form of functionalist thinking. The other pairings attach ideas to the wrong thinkers.

Question 11Nature, Scope and Significance of Sociology

Sociology and psychology are both social sciences. Which statement best distinguishes their central focus?

  1. Sociology uses evidence while psychology relies on speculation
  2. Sociology deals with biology while psychology deals with culture
  3. Sociology studies only ancient societies while psychology studies only modern ones
  4. Sociology emphasises social groups and institutions while psychology emphasises individual mental processes Correct answer.

Explanation

Both disciplines study human behaviour, but sociology foregrounds group life, social structure and institutions, whereas psychology concentrates on individual mental processes and behaviour. The distinction is one of emphasis, not of scientific status.

Question 12Nature, Scope and Significance of Sociology

The statement that sociology is an empirical discipline means that sociological claims must be which of the following?

  1. Derived purely from philosophical speculation
  2. Accepted on the authority of tradition alone
  3. Based on the researcher's personal preferences
  4. Supported by observable evidence gathered through systematic methods Correct answer.

Explanation

Empirical means grounded in observation and evidence rather than pure speculation or authority. Sociologists collect data through surveys, interviews, observation and documents, and theories are assessed against such evidence.

Question 13Nature, Scope and Significance of Sociology

Which of the following illustrates the sociological concept of a social fact as Durkheim defined it?

  1. A person's private daydream about a holiday
  2. The legal rules of marriage that constrain individuals independently of their will Correct answer.
  3. A unique event witnessed by only one person
  4. An individual's involuntary reflex action

Explanation

Durkheim defined social facts as ways of acting, thinking and feeling that are external to the individual and exercise constraint over them, such as legal and moral rules. Private fantasies, reflexes and unique unshared events lack this external and coercive character.

Question 14Nature, Scope and Significance of Sociology

A student argues that sociology is not a science because sociologists themselves are members of the society they study. Which response best reflects the discipline's position?

  1. Sociologists avoid studying their own society altogether
  2. Sociology claims total objectivity identical to physics
  3. Sociology abandons evidence and relies on intuition
  4. Researchers use reflexivity, standardised methods and peer scrutiny to limit bias Correct answer.

Explanation

Sociologists acknowledge that the researcher is part of the social world, and they respond with reflexivity, transparent methods and peer review to reduce bias. The claim that this makes sociology unscientific ignores how all sciences manage observer effects.

Question 15Nature, Scope and Significance of Sociology

Which statement correctly describes the scope of sociology with respect to human societies?

  1. It studies only industrial societies
  2. It studies only political parties
  3. It studies only rural communities
  4. It studies all forms of human association, from families to global institutions Correct answer.

Explanation

Sociology's scope is broad, covering every form of human association including families, castes, religious groups, organisations and global processes. Narrowing it to one type of community or institution misrepresents the discipline.

Question 16Nature, Scope and Significance of Sociology

A district administration wants to know why a scholarship scheme has low uptake among particular communities. Which sociological contribution is most directly relevant?

  1. An audit of the scheme's printing costs
  2. A meteorological forecast for the district
  3. A survey identifying social barriers such as stigma, information gaps and caste networks Correct answer.
  4. A laboratory test of the scholarship's paper quality

Explanation

Low uptake of a welfare scheme is typically shaped by social factors such as stigma, information networks and community norms, which sociological survey research can identify. The other options address physical or accounting matters unrelated to social behaviour.

Question 17Nature, Scope and Significance of Sociology

Critics argue that sociology cannot predict human behaviour with the precision of physics. Which evaluation of this criticism is most defensible?

  1. It is irrelevant, because sociology does not aim to explain anything
  2. It is invalid, because sociology predicts individual acts exactly
  3. It is partly valid, since social prediction is probabilistic, but explanation and probabilistic prediction remain possible Correct answer.
  4. It is fully valid, so sociology produces no reliable knowledge at all

Explanation

Because human beings interpret and respond to their circumstances, sociological predictions are typically probabilistic rather than exact. This limits precision but does not eliminate the possibility of explanation and reasonably reliable prediction, so the criticism is only partly valid.

Question 18Nature, Scope and Significance of Sociology

Which argument best explains why the study of sociology is significant for a plural society such as Karnataka?

  1. It shows that all communities share identical customs
  2. It demonstrates that social conflict is impossible to study
  3. It clarifies how caste, religion, language and region shape inequality and social cohesion Correct answer.
  4. It proves that cultural differences are biologically fixed

Explanation

Sociological analysis illuminates how multiple social divisions and identities interact to shape inequality, cooperation and conflict, which is valuable for governance in a diverse society. It does not treat cultural differences as biologically fixed or deny the study of conflict.

Question 19Nature, Scope and Significance of Sociology

A researcher concludes that poverty in a town is caused by the moral laziness of the poor, without examining wages, land ownership or migration. Which methodological error does this illustrate?

  1. Using too many comparative statistics
  2. Explaining a structural phenomenon by individual-level moral attribution Correct answer.
  3. Applying verstehen too carefully
  4. Relying excessively on peer review

Explanation

The researcher reduces a structural outcome to individual moral character, ignoring the economic and social arrangements that shape poverty. Sociology insists on examining structural causes rather than treating social patterns as personal failings.

Question 20Nature, Scope and Significance of Sociology

Which statement most accurately captures the relationship between sociology and social anthropology as neighbouring disciplines?

  1. Both study social life, but anthropology historically emphasised small-scale societies while sociology emphasised complex industrial ones Correct answer.
  2. Both study social life, but anthropology is confined to the study of plants
  3. Both study social life, but anthropology rejects fieldwork entirely
  4. Both study social life, but sociology rejects all theory

Explanation

The two disciplines overlap in method and subject matter, but their historical specialisations differed: anthropology concentrated on small-scale and non-industrial societies, sociology on modern complex societies. Contemporary practice increasingly overlaps across both fields.

Question 21Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

In sociology, which term refers to a group of people who share a common territory and a sense of belonging based on shared culture and interaction?

  1. Institution
  2. Community
  3. Association
  4. Society Correct answer.

Explanation

Society is the broadest concept, denoting a web of social relationships among people who share a territory and culture and who interact and depend on one another. Community is narrower, being a localised grouping bound by locality and common ties, while association and institution are organised forms within society.

Question 22Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

Which feature most clearly distinguishes a community from an association?

  1. A community is always larger in population than an association
  2. A community has written rules while an association has none
  3. A community exists only in rural areas while an association exists only in cities
  4. A community is based on territory and shared living, while an association is deliberately formed for a specific purpose Correct answer.

Explanation

Community membership is rooted in locality and everyday shared life, so people belong simply by living together. An association, by contrast, is consciously created to pursue a defined interest and members join voluntarily.

Question 23Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

A trade union of textile workers with a written constitution, membership fees and elected officers is best described as which of the following?

  1. A community
  2. A kinship group
  3. An association Correct answer.
  4. A caste group

Explanation

An association is a formally organised group created deliberately to achieve specific objectives, marked by rules, membership criteria and offices. The union's constitution, fees and elected officials fit this definition precisely.

Question 24Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

Which of the following is the best sociological example of a social institution?

  1. The family Correct answer.
  2. A cricket team
  3. A crowd at a bus stop
  4. A neighbourhood

Explanation

An institution is an established, enduring pattern of norms, roles and expected behaviour that fulfils a basic social need. The family is a classic institution because it is a stable arrangement regulating reproduction, care and socialisation.

Question 25Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

Which statement correctly captures the relationship between institutions and associations?

  1. Associations are permanent while institutions are temporary
  2. Institutions and associations are identical because both have offices and members
  3. An association may embody or organise around an institution, but the institution itself is a pattern of norms and roles Correct answer.
  4. An institution is always a building while an association is always a group of people

Explanation

Institutions are relatively stable patterns of norms and expected roles, whereas associations are concrete organised groups. Associations such as a school board or a marriage-registration body may organise around institutional patterns, but the institution is not the same as the organisation.

Question 26Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

A group of passengers who happen to be waiting on the same platform and who have no shared identity or lasting interaction is best called which of the following?

  1. A secondary group
  2. A community
  3. An aggregate Correct answer.
  4. An institution

Explanation

An aggregate is a collection of people who are physically close but lack interaction, shared norms or a sense of belonging. Passengers on a platform who merely share a space fit this category.

Question 27Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

Which characteristic is typical of a primary group?

  1. Face-to-face interaction, emotional ties and a relatively enduring relationship Correct answer.
  2. Membership based solely on a shared occupation
  3. Formal rules, written contracts and impersonal contact
  4. Large membership with indirect communication

Explanation

Primary groups, such as family and close friendship circles, are marked by intimate face-to-face relations, emotional attachment and durability. These qualities make the group an end in itself for members rather than a mere means.

Question 28Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

A company's sales department, where members interact mainly to complete assigned tasks under formal rules, is an example of which type of group?

  1. Primary group
  2. Aggregate
  3. Community
  4. Secondary group Correct answer.

Explanation

Secondary groups are larger, formally organised and oriented to specific goals, with relationships that are relatively impersonal and instrumental. A task-based department with formal rules matches this description.

Question 29Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

Which of the following best defines the sociological meaning of culture?

  1. The level of formal education a person has completed
  2. The biological inheritance that shapes human behaviour
  3. The fine arts and classical music appreciated by the elite
  4. The total way of life of a people, including knowledge, beliefs, customs, art, morals and habits acquired in society Correct answer.

Explanation

In sociology, culture refers to the whole learned and shared way of life of a society, covering material objects as well as knowledge, beliefs, values, norms and customs. It is transmitted socially rather than inherited biologically.

Question 30Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

Which pair correctly distinguishes material culture from non-material culture?

  1. Material culture includes norms; non-material culture includes technology
  2. Material culture includes tools and buildings; non-material culture includes values and beliefs Correct answer.
  3. Material culture includes language; non-material culture includes clothing
  4. Material culture includes values and beliefs; non-material culture includes tools and buildings

Explanation

Material culture consists of the physical objects people make and use, such as tools, clothing and buildings. Non-material culture consists of intangible elements such as values, beliefs, norms and knowledge.

Question 31Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

Shared ideas about what is desirable and worth striving for, such as honesty or equality, are best described as which of the following?

  1. Folkways
  2. Norms
  3. Values Correct answer.
  4. Sanctions

Explanation

Values are the broad ideals a society holds about what is good, right and desirable, and they guide behaviour and provide standards for judging conduct. Norms are more specific rules derived from these values.

Question 32Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

A student is praised by teachers for returning a lost wallet, while a classmate who keeps it is reprimanded. This is best described as which element of social control?

  1. Institution
  2. Folkway
  3. Sanction Correct answer.
  4. Value

Explanation

A sanction is any reaction by others that rewards conformity or punishes deviance; praise and reprimand are respectively positive and negative sanctions. Sanctions thus enforce norms in everyday social life.

Question 33Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

Which of the following best illustrates a folkway rather than a mores?

  1. Prohibiting marriage between close blood relatives
  2. Addressing an elder with a respectful term in a formal setting Correct answer.
  3. Condemning a person who commits murder
  4. Punishing a person who commits theft with imprisonment

Explanation

Folkways are customary norms governing everyday manners and etiquette, whose violation brings mild disapproval rather than serious moral outrage. Mores are strongly held norms whose violation is regarded as a serious moral offense.

Question 34Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

Which statement correctly describes social structure?

  1. It refers to the temporary mood of a crowd
  2. It refers to the personal habits of an individual
  3. It refers to the physical layout of roads and buildings in a city
  4. It refers to the relatively stable pattern of social relationships, positions and institutions in a society Correct answer.

Explanation

Social structure is the enduring arrangement of positions, roles, groups and institutions and the patterned relationships among them. It provides the framework within which individual action takes place.

Question 35Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

A candidate is elected as the president of a college union. In sociological terms, this elected position is best described as which of the following?

  1. An achieved status Correct answer.
  2. A master status
  3. A role set
  4. An ascribed status

Explanation

An achieved status is a social position a person attains through effort, choice or competition, such as an elected office. Ascribed status, by contrast, is assigned at birth or by circumstances beyond individual choice.

Question 36Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

Which of the following is the clearest example of an ascribed status?

  1. Winning a state-level sports medal
  2. Being appointed as a manager after years of service
  3. Being born into a particular caste group Correct answer.
  4. Passing a competitive examination

Explanation

Ascribed status is a position people occupy because of birth or circumstances they do not choose, such as caste, sex or kinship. It stands in contrast to achieved status, which results from individual effort or selection.

Question 37Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

A teacher is expected to prepare lessons, evaluate students fairly and advise parents. These expectations together constitute which of the following?

  1. The role attached to the status of teacher Correct answer.
  2. The master status of the teacher
  3. The ascribed status of the teacher
  4. The institution of education

Explanation

Role refers to the behaviour expected of a person occupying a particular status. The duties of preparing lessons, evaluating fairly and advising parents are the role expectations that go with the status of teacher.

Question 38Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

When a person experiences conflicting expectations arising from two different statuses, such as a working mother expected to stay late at office and also to be home early for her child, this is called which of the following?

  1. Role strain
  2. Role set
  3. Role conflict Correct answer.
  4. Role taking

Explanation

Role conflict occurs when the demands of two or more different statuses clash, pulling the individual in opposing directions. Role strain, by contrast, arises from conflicting demands within a single status.

Question 39Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

Which of the following best defines socialisation?

  1. The lifelong process through which individuals learn the norms, values and roles of their society Correct answer.
  2. The biological maturation of the human body from infancy to adulthood
  3. The process of formally enrolling a person as a member of a club
  4. The process of converting a village into a town

Explanation

Socialisation is the process by which people acquire culture, learn the norms and values of their society and develop the self and social roles. It continues throughout life rather than ending in childhood.

Question 40Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

A child learns language, basic hygiene and family customs within the home from parents and siblings. This phase is best identified as which of the following?

  1. Re-socialisation
  2. Anticipatory socialisation
  3. Primary socialisation Correct answer.
  4. Secondary socialisation

Explanation

Primary socialisation takes place in early childhood within intimate settings such as the family, where the child first learns language, basic norms and a sense of self. Secondary socialisation occurs later in wider settings such as school and workplace.

Question 41Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

Which of the following is a clear example of anticipatory socialisation?

  1. A final-year student adopting the dress and vocabulary of the profession she hopes to enter Correct answer.
  2. A new recruit being drilled in army discipline
  3. A retired official learning to live in an old-age home
  4. A child learning to speak the family's mother tongue

Explanation

Anticipatory socialisation is the process of preparing for a future status by taking on its norms, values and behaviour in advance. A student adopting the ways of a hoped-for profession is rehearsing that future role.

Question 42Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

According to Cooley's concept of the looking-glass self, a person's self-image develops mainly through which process?

  1. Inheriting personality traits from parents
  2. Imagining how others see us and responding to that imagined judgement Correct answer.
  3. Copying the behaviour of animals
  4. Learning formal rules in schools alone

Explanation

Cooley argued that the self is formed through social interaction, as we imagine how we appear to others, imagine their judgement and develop self-feeling accordingly. The self is thus a social mirror rather than something innate.

Question 43Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

Mead's idea of the 'generalised other' refers to which of the following?

  1. A stranger encountered in a public place
  2. The attitude of the wider community that an individual learns to take into account Correct answer.
  3. A formal organisation with written rules
  4. The biological drives present at birth

Explanation

For Mead, the generalised other is the organised attitude of the whole community that the individual internalises. Taking the role of the generalised other enables a person to regulate conduct according to shared standards.

Question 44Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

Which agency of socialisation is usually described as the first and most intimate?

  1. The mass media
  2. The workplace
  3. The family Correct answer.
  4. The peer group

Explanation

The family is generally the earliest and most intimate agency of socialisation, providing the child's first emotional ties, language and basic norms. Other agencies such as peers, media and workplace come into play later or more indirectly.

Question 45Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

A person moves to a new city and gradually learns its language, food habits and local customs. This process is best described as which of the following?

  1. Ascribed status
  2. Primary socialisation
  3. Adult socialisation Correct answer.
  4. Material culture

Explanation

Socialisation continues throughout life, so adults also learn new norms, skills and customs when they change settings. Learning a new city's language and habits is therefore adult socialisation, sometimes overlapping with re-socialisation.

Question 46Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

In sociology, which statement best distinguishes a community from an association?

  1. A community is always larger in population than an association and therefore more complex.
  2. A community is temporary and dissolves once its purpose is achieved, while an association endures across generations.
  3. A community exists only in rural areas, while an association exists only in urban industrial settings.
  4. A community is based on shared territory and emotional bonds, while an association is deliberately formed to pursue a specific interest. Correct answer.

Explanation

A community is a relatively permanent, territorially rooted grouping whose members share a common life and a sense of belonging or 'we-feeling'. An association, by contrast, is consciously created by individuals to pursue a definite purpose, such as a trade union or a club, and it may dissolve when that purpose ends.

Question 47Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

A family sends its children to school, a temple organises religious instruction, and a sports club teaches teamwork and discipline. These arrangements are best understood as examples of which sociological concept?

  1. Primary groups replacing secondary groups
  2. Cultural lag between material and non-material culture
  3. Social institutions performing the function of socialisation Correct answer.
  4. Social mobility within the stratification system

Explanation

Institutions are established patterns of norms and roles organised around basic social needs, and socialisation is one such need met jointly by family, school, religion and leisure bodies. Each example shows an organised set of roles transmitting values and skills to new members.

Question 48Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

Which example most clearly shows a person occupying a status without yet fully performing its attached role?

  1. A newly elected student secretary who has not yet begun attending union meetings Correct answer.
  2. A grandfather who tells folk tales to his grandchildren each evening
  3. A shopkeeper who greets regular customers by name every morning
  4. A nurse who checks patients' vital signs during a night shift

Explanation

Status refers to the position a person holds, whereas role refers to the dynamic expectations and behaviour attached to that position. The newly elected secretary already holds the status but has not yet enacted the duties that constitute the role. The other examples show people actively carrying out the expectations of their positions.

Question 49Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

A village panchayat fines a household for dumping waste in a public tank, while neighbours also express strong disapproval of the family. Which reading best captures the sociological relationship between norms, values and sanctions?

  1. Norms and values are identical, so any behaviour that attracts disapproval must also violate a written law.
  2. The fine is a value and the neighbours' disapproval is a norm, since formal reactions always rank above informal ones.
  3. Sanctions create values, because a community only comes to value something after it has punished those who ignore it.
  4. The norm against polluting shared water rests on the value of collective welfare, and both the fine and the disapproval are sanctions enforcing it. Correct answer.

Explanation

Values are shared conceptions of what is desirable, such as the welfare of the village, and norms are the specific rules derived from them, such as not polluting the tank. Sanctions are the rewards or penalties, formal like a fine or informal like disapproval, through which a group upholds its norms.

Question 50Basic Concepts in Sociology (society, community, association, institution, social group, culture, social structure, status and role, norms and values, socialisation)

A student from a farming family joins an engineering college, learns its technical vocabulary and dress conventions, and begins to think of herself as a future professional. Which concept most precisely describes this process?

  1. Cultural lag, because her family customs change more slowly than her college habits
  2. Secondary socialisation through a formal agency, involving the adoption of a new reference group Correct answer.
  3. Repressive socialisation based on the threat of physical punishment
  4. Primary socialisation within the family, since her parents remain her closest companions

Explanation

Secondary socialisation occurs later in life within formal, impersonal agencies such as schools and workplaces, and it commonly involves acquiring the norms of a new group that becomes a reference point for identity. Learning a profession's vocabulary, dress and self-image fits this pattern precisely.