Sample Test on Anthropology
Choose the letter of the best answer.
1. 'Lost villages' like Pilfershire can be found:
a. using satellite imaging.
b. only by archaeologists.
c. often just by
taking a walk in the woods.
d. All of the above.
2. The belief that processes like weathering and erosion are
responsible for the appearance of the earth is known as:
a. natural selection.
b. creationism.
c. uniformitarianism.
d.
adaptation.
3. A place where people lived and/or worked and where the
physical evidence of their existence can be or has been recovered is:
a. a feature.
b. an ecofact.
c. a site.
d. an artifact.
4. Archaeology is a branch of
a. cultural anthropology.
b. biological anthropology.
c. anthropology.
d. paleoanthropology.
5. How does anthropology differ from other social sciences
such as economics and sociology?
a. The other social sciences are holistic and
integrative in their approach.
b. Anthropology tends to specialize in the
workings of specific systems.
c. Anthropology is
holistic and integrative in its approach.
d. Anthropology is more important than the
other social sciences.
6. Researchers who study humans by residing in particular
societies and observing the behaviors of the people are:
a. archaeologists.
b. linguists.
c. ethnographers.
d. paleoanthropologists.
7. A person who believes that the current appearance of the
earth can be best explained as having resulted from a series of natural
disasters is known as a:
a. debaclist.
b. cataclysmist.
c. catastrophist.
c. calamitist.
8. When the author refers to the 'detritus of past people'
he is writing about their:
a. debris.
b. written records.
c. gravestones.
d. all the above.
9. Creationists believed the Earth had not changed since its
creation less than six _________ years earlier.
a. hundred
b. thousand
c. million
d. billion
10. In 1797, John Frere found some unusual _________ in an
English quarry.
a. animal remains
b. creationist documents
c. stone tools
d. human skulls
11. The significance of Frere's discovery was that the
things he'd found were located
a. above a large deposit of gold
b. beneath the
remains of extinct animals
c. in a place no one thought humans had ever
lived
d. right where the elves had left them.
12.Which archaeological method is best for identifying
large-scale land modifications?
a. test pits
b. ground-penetrating radar
c. aerial photography
d. proton magnetometers
13. Stratigraphy is:
a. the study of the
earth's layers.
b. the jutting forward of the lower face and
jaw area.
c. a design etched into a rock face.
d. the study of ancient diseases.
14. Charles Lyell, an English geologist and a
uniformitarian, believed that the world must be extremely old. His based his
argument on the fact that
a. he had developed an innovative reading of
Genesis.
b. catastrophic events (volcanoes, floods)
had happened long ago.
c. he had found human and mammoth bones in
the same cave.
d. erosion works
incredibly slowly.
15. The three-age system refers to:
a. the human physical stages of infancy,
puberty and adulthood.
b. the ripening of cheese.
c. the breakdown of
human culture into a Stone Age, a Bronze Age and an Iron Age.
d. the chronological classification of human
achievement into a Gold Age, a Silver Age, and a Bronze Age.
16. Who is best known as an ethnographer?
a. Jane Goodall
b. Dian Fossey
c. Margaret Mead
d. Farley Mowat
17. In nature a mode or strategy for survival is known as:
a. an association.
b. artificial selection.
c. an adaptation.
d. adaptive radiation.
18. While studying animals (e.g., finches and turtles) on
the Galapagos islands, Darwin was struck by the fact that
a. each island seemed
to have a sort of finch or turtle that was related to the species on the
mainland, but recognizably different.
b. the island species were more advanced
(stronger, faster) than those on the mainland.
c. the human population of the islands lived
in tranquility with the animals.
d. fossil remains showed that the animals had
existed there for millennia largely unchanged.
19. _________ is the set of strategies for survival that are
NOT genetically determined.
a. Evolution
b. Adaptation
c. Culture
d. Social life
20. 'Subsistence patterns' refers to:
a. what people ate
b. where they lived
c. how they buried their dead
d. both A and C
21. According to Lewis Henry Morgan's stages of human
culture, labeled savagery, barbarism and civilization, which of the following
statements is correct?
a. A culture that is in a stage other than
civilized is 'stuck' there due to something lacking in their society.
b. A culture is civilized once it discovers
pottery and animal husbandry.
c. The advancement of raw materials is the
determining factor in deciding what stage a society is in.
d. All the above
22. Which
field of anthropology concentrates on the human past?
a. paleoanthropology
b. archaeology
c. primatology
d. both A and B
23. Trace
element analysis:
a. determines the geographic source of
materials used by ancient peoples
b. is used to discover archaeological sites without digging
c. classifies items based on similarities and differences
d. determines spatial distribution of buried materials by digging holes
24. A
proposed explanation for some phenomenon that may be derived initially from
empirical observation by a process called induction is a:
a. hypothesis.
b. theory.
c. scientific method.
d. deduction.
25. Artifacts
_________; ecofacts __________
a. are valuable and rare; are easy to come by.
b. are made by humans; exhibit traces of
human activity.
c. decay rapidly; last for a long time.
d. are facts about art; are facts about nature.
26. A site's
spatial arrangement is:
a. not as important as the recovered artifacts
b. more important than the recovered artifacts
c. ruined once digging begins
d. none of the above
27. Which
subfield of anthropology could be described as studying 'other people's
garbage?'
a. primatology
b. archaeology
c. paleoanthropology
d. linguistics
28. Taphonomy
is
a. a systematic classification based on similarities and differences.
b. the study of how materials ended up in
a particular place.
c. a study of the spatial relationships among artifacts, ecofacts, and
features.
d. a dating technique based on the decay of a radioactive isotope of
carbon.
29. A
_________ contains primary refuse; a _________ contains secondary refuse.
a. kitchen; garden
b. grave; hospital
c. picnic site; trash
dump
d. dumpster; recycling bin
30. Pompeii
was unusually well preserved because
a. the layer of
volcanic pumice created a seal over the remains
b. the avalanches pushed the remains into the sea
c. poisonous volcanic gases killed people instantly
d. the Romans embalmed the victims
31. The
appropriateness of pedestrian surveys depends on two factors:
a. primary and secondary refuse
b. artifacts and ecofacts
c. visibility and
obtrusiveness
d. test pits and remote-sensing devices
32. Which of
the following is a remote-sensing device used to find archaeological sites?
a. ground-penetrating radar
b. proton magnetometers
c. electrical resistivity meters
d. all the above
33. Which of
the following methods is not used to remove the soil enclosing site materials?
a. brushes
b. trowels
c. shovels
d. dental picks
34. The context in which an artifact
is found:
a. is lost once digging begins.
b. is not as important as the artifact.
c. provides only a fraction of information.
d. is crucial to understanding the site.
35. Scientists
don't usually determine an artifact's function by studying its
a. morphology.
b. molecular
structure.
c. location.
d. wear patterns.
36. The
presence of caribou bones found near the Hudson River valley in New York from a
site dated 10,000 years ago implies:
a. there were good relations between Canada and the United States.
b. a much colder climate during that time
period.
c. the main food source was caribou meat.
d. the pre-historic people who lived at this site had high cholesterol.
37. Which of
the following signifies that a person was very young when they died?
a. The fusion of the epiphyses to the diaphysis.
b. The absence of cranial sutures.
c. The presence of
deciduous dentition.
d. All of the above.
38. What is
the difference between an absolute date and a relative date?
a. An absolute date
refers to a year or a range of years, while a relative date indicates a
chronological order.
b. A relative date is derived from radiometric dating techniques, while
an absolute date comes from guesswork.
c. A relative date refers to a chronological
order, while an absolute date indicates a year or a range of years
d. An absolute date involves vodka, while a relative date is illegal.
39. By
analyzing the levels of 13C in bones, researchers can establish whether an
individual ate
a. mostly meat or most vegetables
b. mostly grains or
mostly nuts and fruits
c. no dairy or lots of dairy
d. a certain type of honey produced only in sub-Saharan Africa
40. Which
dating technique is based on the patterns of tree-ring growth?
a. radiocarbon dating
b. fission-track dating
c. paleomagnetic dating
d. dendrochronology
Answers below:
1 to 7: c
8. d
9. b
10. c
11. b
12. c
13. a
14. d
15 to 17. c
18. a
19. c
20. a
21. d
22. d
23. a
24. a
25. b
26. d
27. a
28. b
29. c
30. a
31.c
32. d
33. c
34. d
35. b
36. b
37. c
38. a
39. b
40. d
