GED and HiSET social studies — psychology, sociology and anthropology

The HiSET describes its social studies subtest as covering history, political science, psychology, sociology, anthropology, geography and economics. Three of those fields — psychology, sociology and anthropology — are the study of how people learn, how groups shape them and how cultures differ, and none of the other materials in this category touches them. This one does, with the core ideas an introductory course would cover, each put to work in a situation from adult life. (The GED does not list these fields by name, so this material matters most to HiSET candidates, although the reasoning about evidence carries over to both tests.)

The psychology questions start with learning. A ringtone that always comes before a demanding call from a supervisor shows classical conditioning; a manager who stops sending reminder emails to people who finish training early shows negative reinforcement, which is not the same thing as punishment. An electrician studying for a license shows how rehearsal and meaningful links carry information from short-term to long-term memory. Erikson's stage of generativity against stagnation describes the middle-aged adult balancing work and family, and commuters walking past a struggling traveler show the bystander effect.

The sociology questions separate folkways from mores, show socialization continuing into adulthood as a new hospital worker learns the unwritten rules, classify ascribed and achieved status, and name the intergenerational mobility of a daughter of manual laborers who becomes a doctor. The anthropology questions contrast ethnocentrism with cultural relativism through a traveler's reaction to eating with one's hands, and describe participant observation, the fieldwork method at the heart of the discipline. One question asks what two studies can actually conclude: an experiment with random assignment and a control group can support a claim about cause; a survey showing that two things go together cannot.

The flashcards cover twenty-three terms, from classical conditioning to kinship. The written work asks for fuller explanations: the kinds of reinforcement with examples, how to study so that information lasts, the design of an experiment, why bystanders fail to help, norms and sanctions, the agents of socialization, cultural relativism and its limits, and kinship systems. The oral exam gives you a situation and asks which concept it shows and why.

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• Identify classical conditioning and distinguish positive reinforcement, negative reinforcement and punishment
• Explain how rehearsal and encoding move information into long-term memory, and apply one stage of Erikson's theory
• Tell an experiment from a correlational study and say what each can conclude
• Recognize the bystander effect and explain socialization as a lifelong process
• Classify norms, statuses and types of social mobility
• Distinguish ethnocentrism from cultural relativism and describe participant observation and kinship

Practice material written by Zestly on introductory psychology, sociology and anthropology, the behavioral-science fields named in the published description of the HiSET Social Studies subtest. All scenarios are invented for practice.