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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. When did Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood first hit the New York Times bestseller lists?

2. What refers to casual drinking in a social setting without an intent to get drunk?

3. In what year did Airwalk’s sales begin to falter, according to the author in Chapter 6?

4. One of the researchers who rode in the needle exchange vans in Baltimore to interview super-exchangers was an epidemiologist by what name?

5. What imposes automatic punishment for infractions of a stated rule with the intention of eliminating undesirable conduct?

Short Essay Questions

1. What example does the author present from Micronesia in the beginning of Chapter 7?

2. How did crime in New York change in the decade after the Bernie Goetz case? Why do most people believe this change happened?

3. How does the author describe the success of Minister John Wesley in Chapter 5?

4. How does the author describe the incident that made Bernie Goetz famous?

5. What example does the author give from The Psychology of Rumor in Chapter 6?

6. Who did Airwalk employ as a connector, according to the author in Chapter 6? Why?

7. According to the author, a teenager who begins smoking will not develop an addiction threshold for up to three years. Given this, how does Gladwell propose prevention of regular smokers?

8. What is channel capacity, and what importance does it have, according to the author?

9. How does the author describe the publication of Rebecca Wells's novel Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood in Chapter 5?

10. What theory does Gladwell introduce to explain the change in New York City crime in Chapter 4?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Discuss the life and work of Mark Alpert and analyze Alpert’s role in epidemic trends. How does the author describe Alpert’s personality? How does this differ from a connector?

Essay Topic 2

Define the broken windows theory and analyze it as it applies in your contemporary world. What are some examples in your day-to-day life that you can see this theory play out? How and when can the effects of the broken windows theory be seen?

Essay Topic 3

Describe and discuss the experiments led by Ed Palmer and Barbara Flagg for Sesame Street and analyze the findings of their research. How did episodes of Sesame Street evolve with this new information? What other uses have their methods been implemented for?

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