IGNOU 2019 M.Phil/Ph.D. solved entrance test paper

Journalism and Mass Communication 2019

1. For calculating rank order correlation, which data type is most suitable?

• Nominal
• Ordinal
• Interval
• Ratio

Explanation- The Spearman rank-order correlation coefficient is a nonparametric measure of the strength and direction of association that exists between two variables measured on at least an ordinal scale¹. It is denoted by the symbol r_s.

2. ‘R’ is a:

• Survey Collection Tool
• Data Analysis Software
• Big Data Crawler
• Citation Manager

Explanation- By Ross Ihaka and Robert Gentleman, ‘R’ software like SPSS was designed as a statistical platform for data cleaning, analysis, and representation. This shows how popular R programming is in data science.

3. ‘Digital Divide’ is in context of:

• Information haves and information have-nots
• Access to Computers
• Access to the Internet
• All the above

Explanation- Digital divide is a term that refers to the gap between demographics and regions that have access to modern information and communications technology, and those that don’t or have restricted access. This technology can include the telephone, television, personal computers and the Internet².

4. Data derived from reliable measurements or observation is known as:

• Experimental Data
• Empirical Data
• Ethnographic Data
• Electronic Data

Explanation- Empirical evidence is information acquired by observation or experimentation. Scientists record and analyse this data³. 

5. Arrange the units of computer memory in ascending order.

• Terabyte
• Kilobyte
• Gigabyte
• Megabyte

• (a), (c), (d), (b)
• (a), (d), (b), (c)
• (b), (d), (c), (a)
• (b), (c), (d), (a)

Explanation- Units of Computer memory in ascending order.
Bit, Byte, Kilo Byte, Mega Byte, Giga Byte, Tera Byte, Peta Byte, Exa Byte, Zetta Byte, Yota Byte, Bronto Byte.

6. Sustainable Developments Goal number 4 deals with:

• Poverty
• Gender
• Education
• Equality

Explanation- The Sustainable Development Goals are a collection of 17 global goals set by the United Nations General Assembly in 2015 for the year 2030⁴. 
GOAL 1: No Poverty; GOAL 2: Zero Hunger; GOAL 3: Good Health and Well-being; GOAL 4: Quality Education; GOAL 5: Gender Equality; GOAL 6: Clean Water and Sanitation.

7. ———– refers to the use of digital tools to achieve Social and Political change.

• Media Activism
• Online Activism
• Vital Movement
• Digital Trolls

Explanation- Media activism is a broad category of activism that utilizes media and communication technologies for social and political movements⁵.

8. Gaining knowledge about the way media institutions work and how they produce content is known as

• Journalism Training
• Mass Communication Education
• Media and Information Literacy
• Communication Training

Explanation- Media Literacy is the ability to access, analyse, evaluate and create media in a variety of forms and all these we receive through media⁶.

9. ‘Oligopoly’ in media industry refers to:

• Industry monopolised by large number of media companies
• Industry monopolised by small number of media companies
• Industry monopolised by medium number of media companies
• None of the above

Explanation- An oligopoly is much like a monopoly, in which small number of firms or only single company has control over most of a market.

10. What is the purpose of pilot study in a research?

• To gauge suitability of conducting full study
• To find respondents for full study
• To finalise methodology for full study
• To finalise sampling for full study

Explanation- A pilot study is a small scale preliminary study conducted in order to evaluate feasibility, time, cost, adverse events, and improve upon the study design prior to performance of a full-scale research project⁷.

11. Identify the theory whose core idea is that ‘technology shapes the cause of human evolution’.

• Technology Controlled Theory
• Technological Determinism Theory
• Technology Dissonance Theory
• Technological Resistivity Theory

Explanation- Technological determinism tries to understand how technology has had an impact on human action and thought⁸.

12. In which communication setting, transactional analysis is most suitable?

• Intra-personal communication
• Inter-personal communication
• Group Communication
• Mass Communication

Explanation- TA studies transactions amongst people and understands their interpersonal behavior. It was developed by Eric Berne, a psychotherapist.

13. USENET belongs to the period of:

• Pre Computer Network
• Pre WWW Network
• Client Network
• Internet

Explanation-  USENET is a worldwide distributed discussion system available on computers and over a decade before the World Wide Web went online and the general public received access to the Internet, making it one of the oldest computer network communications systems⁹.

14. ‘Framing’ refers to the process by which the:

• Media places information into frame
• Media places news story into frame
• Media places event into frame
• All the above

Explanation- The Framing theory in media was first put forth by Goffman, under the title of Frame Analysis. The concept of framing is related to the agenda-setting tradition. The basis of framing theory is that the media focuses attention on certain events and then places them within a field of meaning¹⁰.

15. Non-parametric tests measure variables at:

• Ratio level
• Interval level
• Ordinal level
• Non-conditional level

Explanation- Nonparametric statistical tests are used instead of the parametric tests when the data is nominal or ordinal (rather than interval or ratio)¹¹.

16. Find ‘mean’ for the following dataset.

19, 24, 28, 29, 30, 34, 38, 42, 49, 51, 51, 61, 64

• 35
• 40
• 45
• 50

17. Find ‘median’ for the following dataset.

19, 24, 28, 29, 30, 34, 38, 42, 49, 51, 51, 61, 64

• 35
• 36
• 37
• 38

18. Find ‘mode’ for the following dataset.

19, 24, 28, 29, 30, 34, 38, 42, 49, 51, 51, 61, 64

• 51
• 49
• 42
• 38

19. Find ‘variance’ for the following dataset.

19, 24, 28, 29, 30, 34, 38, 42, 49, 51, 51, 61, 64

• 201.8
• 202.8
• 203.8
• 204.8

20. Find ‘Standard deviation’ for the following dataset.

19, 24, 28, 29, 30, 34, 38, 42, 49, 51, 51, 61, 64

• 14.28
• 15.28
• 16.28
• 17.28

21. Who proposed ‘ABX Model of Communication’?

• Seven Windahl
• James Dearing
• Maxwell McCombs
• Thodore Newcomb

Explanation- The New Comb’s model or ‘ABX Model of Communication was introduced by Theodore M Newcomb in 1953.He concentrates on the social purpose of communication, showing all communication as a means of sustaining relationships between people¹². 

22. Term ‘Digital Natives’ refers to people who have

• Inhabited the terrain from childhood
• Inhabited the terrain of the internet from adulthood
• Access to the internet occasionally
• Access to the internet always

Explanation- Digital natives are the opposite of digital immigrants; they have been interacting with technology from childhood¹³. Digital native is a term coined by Mark Prensky in 2001 used to describe the generation of people who grew up in the digital age¹⁴.

23. ‘Creative Common’ (CC) gives license of:

• Complete freedom for share, use and build
• Complete freedom for share, use and build with attribution
• Complete freedom for share, use and built for non-commercial
• Complete freedom for share, use and build only under share alike

Explanation- A CC license is used when an author wants to give other people the right to share, use, and build upon a work that he or she (that author) has created.
There are six different Creative Commons licenses: CC BY, CC BY-SA, CC BY-NC, CC BY-ND, CC BY-NC-SA, CC BY-NC-ND. The letter pairs indicate conditions for use¹⁵.

24. In ‘Information Society’, the information has become the central and most significant:

• Resource
• Raw material
• Commodity
• Natural source

Explanation- Information Society is a term for a society in which the creation, distribution, and The economist Fritz Machlup develop the concept of the information society.
Closely related concepts are the post-industrial society (Daniel Bell) and network society (Manuel Castells)¹⁶.

25. A hypothesis that suggest that, changes in one variable cause changes in another, is referred to:

• Relational hypothesis
• Causal hypothesis
• Null hypothesis
• Associative hypothesis

Explanation-

• Causal hypotheses aim to determine if changes in one variable cause changes in another¹⁷.
• Relational hypotheses aim to determine if relationships exist between a set of variables.
• A null hypothesis is a hypothesis that says there is no statistical significance between the two variables¹⁷. 
• Alternative hypothesis is one that states there is a statistically significant relationship between two variables¹⁷.

26. Identity the ‘’Open Source Software’’ from the following.

• Open office
• Microsoft office
• Linux OS
• Mac OS

(a)and (c)                       (a), (c) and (d)              (b) and (c)                      (b) and (d)

Explanation- Open source software is software with source code that anyone can inspect, distribute, modify, and enhance. Example- Mozilla Firefox and Chromium.
Some software has source code that only the person, team, or organization that created it—and maintains exclusive control over it—can modify. It is known as “proprietary” or “closed source” software. Microsoft Office and Adobe Photoshop are examples of proprietary software¹⁸.

27. Who introduced ‘noise’ in a communication model?

• Shannon and Weaver
• Denis McQuail
• Wilber Schramm
• Harold Lasswell

Explanation- Noise was introduced as a concept in communication theory by Shannon and Weaver in the 1940s.

28. Through ‘data traingulation method’ a researcher can enhance his/her study’s:

• Popularity
• Validity
• Accessibility
• Readability

Explanation- This is a way of assuring the validity of research through the use of a variety of methods to collect data on the same topic, which involves different types of samples as well as methods of data collection¹⁹.
Denzin (1978) identified four basic types of triangulation:²⁰

• Data triangulation: involves time, space, and persons.
• Investigator triangulation: involves multiple researchers in an investigation.
• Theory triangulation: involves using more than one theoretical scheme in the interpretation of the phenomenon.
• Methodological triangulation: involves using more than one method to gather data, such as interviews, observations, questionnaires, and documents.

29. A construct is a combination of:

• Variables
• Hypotheses
• Control factors
• Concepts

Explanation- A construct is an indicator variable that measures a characteristics, or trait. For example, college admission scores are constructs that measure how well a student is likely to do in their first year²¹.

30. Pre-conceived beliefs about the characteristics of a group are referred as:

• Prejudice
• Stereotype
• Racism
• Hegemony

Explanation-

• Stereotypes are beliefs that we have about the characteristics of a group.
• Prejudice means preconceived opinion that is not based on reason or actual experience²².
• Hegemony– Leadership or dominance, especially by one state or social group over others²³.
• Racism is the belief in the superiority of one race over another, which often results in discrimination and prejudice towards people based on their race or ethnicity²⁴. 

References-

1. https://statistics.laerd.com/spss-tutorials/spearmans-rank-order-correlation-using-spss-statistics.php
2. https://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/digital-divide
3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empirical_evidence
4. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sustainable_Development_Goals
5. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Media_activism
6. https://www.medialit.org/media-literacy-definition-and-more
7. https://slideplayer.com/slide/6027740/
8. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological_determinism
9. https://wikimili.com/en/Usenet
10. https://masscommtheory.com/theory-overviews/framing-theory/
11. http://www.mathcs.duq.edu/~packer/Courses/Psy624/Nonparametric.html
12. https://www.communicationtheory.org/the-newcomb’s-model/
13. https://medium.com/digital-reflections/digital-natives-and-digital-immigrants-how-are-they-different-e849b0a8a1d3
14. https://www.investopedia.com/terms/d/digital-native.asp
15. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_Commons_license
16. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_society
17. https://study.com/academy/lesson/causal-relational-hypotheses-definitions-examples.html
18. https://opensource.com/resources/what-open-source
19. https://www.researchgate.net/post/What_is_triangulation_of_data_in_qualitative_research_Is_it_a_method_of_validating_the_information_collected_through_various_methods
20. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triangulation_(social_science)
21. https://www.quora.com/What-is-a-construct-in-research-methods
22. https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prejudice
23. http://www.caledonia.org.uk/hegemony.htm
24. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racism

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