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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. What does Gladwell say one has to have to gain success?

2. What does access via terminals replace at Joy's college?

3. What does Gladwell conclude about the heart health of Roseto's residents?

4. To where does Langan transfer from his first college?

5. What does Roger notice about the majority of the hockey players in the game he is watching?

Short Essay Questions

1. Who is Chris Langan?

2. How does Joy and some of his fellow students make it possible to use the computers more than is allowed and what is the result?

3. What makes Roseto an "outlier" town and how does this fact come to light?

4. What does Gladwell say a surface examination of the Canadian hockey league system would suggest?

5. What does IQ stand for and who developed a test to measure it?

6. How are students in the hockey leagues grouped and what is the way the children move into other leagues?

7. Who is Bill Joy and what did he do?

8. What is the origination of the title of this chapter, "The Matthew Effect"?

9. What experiment does Lewis Terman carry out beginning in the 1920s?

10. Why is the local physician's claim unusual, and what does Wolf decide to do?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Often, authors will write about "what they know," and sometimes knowing a little about the author makes the books more interesting. Discuss the following:

1. Research and give a brief biographical sketch of Malcolm Gladwell.

2. What in Gladwell's background may have helped him in writing Outliers? What may have influenced the way he depicts various characters and scenes?

3. Do you think there is always some of the author's own life in his/her novels? Why or why not? Give examples.

Essay Topic 2

Hostile takeovers become more and more common and Flom and others receive more and more work. Finally, the white shoe firms come around and start to take on the work, but by this time Flom has so much more experience at it that he is able to command a large part of the business and surpass many of the established firms. Had he not been excluded for being Jewish when he first started, he would have lost the advantage, Gladwell explains.

1. Explain irony in the context of Joe Flom's success. Use examples from Outliers to support your answer.

2. Do you think the way the circumstances changed in the law profession might have made the white Christian lawyers decide prejudice was not in their best interest? Why or why not? Use examples from Outliers and your own life to support your answer.

3. Make up an example of how a minority in your school might be successful at an endeavor because of prejudice. Use examples from Outliers and your own life to support your answer.

Essay Topic 3

Gladwell makes a number of comparisons throughout his text. Choose one of the following to discuss:

1. Compare the way honor is seen in the southern United States to the way it seems to be viewed in the northern states. Use examples from Outliers to support your answer.

2. Compare the difference between the cultural legacy of the United States and Colombia. Use examples from Outliers to support your answer.

3. Compare the way that Oppenheimer handled criticism and problems with his behavior to the way that Langan did. Use examples from Outliers to support your answer.

(see the answer keys)

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