Pre-District Social Science Practice Test

Question 1

Approximately how many years have passed since the climate became roughly what we know it to be today?

Answer 1

11,700

Question 2

What best describes the Holocene epoch?

Answer 2

an interglacial period

Question 3

Which of the following was a direct result of the joint conference on the ‘Assessment of the Role of Carbon Dioxide of Other Greenhouse Gases in Climate Variations and Associated Impacts’?

Answer 3

the formation of the Advisory Group on Greenhouse Gases (AGGG)

Question 4

Before the Holocene, the global human population may not have surpassed?

Answer 4

10 million

Question 5

A U.S. government report released by the White House in 2021 estimates how many people move from their homes due to extreme weather events every year?

Answer 5

30 million

Question 6

Melting ice sheets around the North Pole is an example of a(n)?

Answer 6

positive feedback

Question 7

In what year did Greta Thunberg begin school strikes to protest her government’s inaction on climate, which led to the creation of the global movement called Fridays for Future?

Answer 7

2018

Question 8

When did the Late Holocene period end?

Answer 8

it had not yet ended

Question 9

What best expresses William Nierenberg’s policy regarding climate change in the early 1990s?

Answer 9

he advocated that variability in solar energy caused global warming

Question 10

Which group of people ruled Mesopotamia when abrupt climate changes occurred there around 2250 BCE?

Answer 10

the Akkadians

Question 11

Who was the first chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)?

Answer 11

Bert Bolin

Question 12

In 2017, who said the Paris Agreement of 2015 put the U.S. at a ‘very big economic disadvantage’?

Answer 12

Donald Trump

Question 13

The Anthropocene is a term that describes a new geological epoch that recognizes the central role of humankind today in?

Answer 13

geology and ecology

Question 14

What is the general marker of the start of the Holocene epoch?

Answer 14

the end of the last ice age

Question 15

In response to the massive Canadian forest fires in the summer of 2023, which cable news channel gave airtime to known supporters of the oil industry who denied scientific consensus on the dangers of smoke?

Answer 15

Fox

Question 16

What best describes why it is risky scholarship to desire to prove too specific a thesis before one studies one’s sources?

Answer 16

such an approach could lead to biases in the results

Question 17

When did discussion of the Industrial Revolution begin?

Answer 17

in the late-1700s

Question 18

In 1957, the Soviet Union carried out what international sensation?

Answer 18

it launched the first artificial earth satellite

Question 19

What best describes the Late Holocene?

Answer 19

it spans a period of human history that is well documented

Question 20

What important solar energy events occur approximately every 26,000 years, 41,000 years, and 100,000 years?

Answer 20

Milankovitch cycles

Question 21

Fossil fuels are best described as being formed from?

Answer 21

the remains of living organisms from past geological epochs

Question 22

Why did Al Gore lose the presidential election to George W. Bush in the year 2000?

Answer 22

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled against Al Gore over voting ballots in Florida

Question 23

What key factor did J.R. McNeill assert was the cause of the ‘Great Acceleration’ starting around 1950?

Answer 23

a significant increase in the human population

Question 24

With regard to climate, what is the most notable about French historians E. Le Roy Ladurie and Fernand Braudel?

Answer 24

they were among the first historians to include climate in their narratives of global history

Question 25

The Wolf, Maunder, and Dalton solar minima all correspond to changes which occurred in the?

Answer 25

European Alps

Question 26

Who first used the term Anthropocene in the year 2000?

Answer 26

Paul J. Crutzen and Eugene F. Stoermer

Question 27

In 1992, the UN Conference on Environment and Development founded the UN Climate Change. What is its formal name?

Answer 27

United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)

Question 28

Which epoch immediately preceded the Anthropocene?

Answer 28

the Holocene

Question 29

Why did Michael McCormick assert 536 CE was ‘the worst year’ to be alive?

Answer 29

volcanic eruptions ushered in a cold year without a summer

Question 30

The three components of the Triple Planetary Crisis are?

Answer 30

climate change, air pollution, and biodiversity loss

Question 31

What is the most common synonym for carbon sequestration?

Answer 31

carbon capture

Question 32

Reactions to climate change caused by forcing are best called what?

Answer 32

feedbacks

Question 33

Who warned that the Green New Deal, if it were enacted, could problematically bolster what he calls ‘climate colonialism’?

Answer 33

Olufemi O. Taiwo

Question 34

What is the concept of settler colonialism, as mentioned in the USAD Social Science Resource Guide?

Answer 34

the practice of forcibly obtaining land from existing inhabitants

Question 35

With regard to the rise and fall of the Roman and Greek Empires, scholars?

Answer 35

have yet to determine a conclusive answer of the importance of climate trends

Question 36

Who is noted as one of the first historians to demonstrate that sources in the archives of society could be used to produce trustworthy climate reconstructions?

Answer 36

Christian Pfister

Question 37

The mandate of heaven concept that external conditions such as prosperity in the land and favorable weather validated the authority of the current rule was established in which dynasty?

Answer 37

Zhou dynasty

Question 38

The Early Holocene epoch lasted from around?

Answer 38

11,700 to 8,236 years ago

Question 39

According to a New York Times article, the leading issue that distinguished the candidates on the environment in the 2000 United States Presidential Election was related to the?

Answer 39

Kyoto Protocol

Question 40

Which state or country below has been spared climate-related abnormally severe fires over the last few years?

Answer 40

England

Question 41

What is the Justice40 Initiative?

Answer 41

justice-related climate change policy introduced by the Biden Administration

Question 42

At the beginning of the LIA in the 1300s, what plague devastated European populations?

Answer 42

the Black Death

Question 43

What best explains why ice cores from ancient glaciers are so important to researchers of climate change?

Answer 43

they can reveal atmospheric conditions hundreds of millennia ago