Chapter 5 Quiz: The Ethical Compass — Consent, Power, and the Boundaries of Influence

12 questions. For each multiple-choice question, select the best answer. Short-answer questions should be answered in 2–4 sentences.

Question 1. The chapter distinguishes between the "legal minimum" and the "ethical ideal" in discussions of consent. Which of the following best characterizes this distinction?

a) Legal standards for consent are always more demanding than ethical ones, because law is more specific.

b) An encounter can be legally permissible — no force, no explicit refusal — and still fail ethical standards if, for example, the "yes" was driven by fear of saying no.

c) Ethical standards for consent are essentially the same as legal standards but are enforced by social rather than legal mechanisms.

d) Legal definitions of consent have no relevance to ethical discussions, because they operate in entirely different domains.

Question 2. What is the core claim of the affirmative consent model?

a) Consent must be given in writing to be considered valid.

b) Any ambiguous signal should be interpreted as a refusal until further clarification is obtained.

c) Genuine agreement requires a positive expression of willingness rather than merely the absence of protest.

d) Affirmative consent applies only in formal institutional contexts such as universities, not in personal dating life.

Question 3. The chapter argues that power differentials affect consent in two distinct ways. Which of the following correctly identifies both?

a) They create legal vulnerabilities and they make documentation of consent more important.

b) They create practical constraints on refusal (the cost of saying no is higher) and they create epistemic biases (the more-powerful person misreads how their attention is received).

c) They make the less-powerful person less likely to desire the more-powerful person and they make the more-powerful person more attractive.

d) They are primarily relevant in formal workplace contexts and do not significantly affect personal dating life.

Question 4. According to Susan Fiske's research on power and social attention, powerful people tend to misread how their romantic attention is received because:

a) They have less practice reading social cues, having been isolated from social feedback.

b) They have fewer incentives to attend carefully to others' actual states, because they have less at stake in reading the situation accurately.

c) They are deliberately trained in corporate culture to ignore the preferences of subordinates.

d) They have higher testosterone levels, which impairs emotional recognition.

Question 5. The chapter introduces the concept of "legitimate epistemic actions." Which of the following is the best example of a legitimate epistemic action in courtship?

a) Deliberately waiting 24 hours before responding to texts in order to manufacture anxiety-driven desire in the other person.

b) Presenting yourself in your best light by genuinely developing and sharing your most interesting qualities and stories.

c) Asking questions designed to exploit the other person's need for validation in order to create emotional attachment.

d) Creating a dating profile that exaggerates your income and status to attract matches you would not otherwise receive.

Question 6. The chapter provides a test for distinguishing manipulation from legitimate influence. Which of the following correctly states that test?

a) If the behavior involves strong emotions, it is probably manipulation; if it is calm and rational, it is probably legitimate.

b) If the other person would object if they fully understood what you were doing and why, you are in manipulation territory.

c) If the behavior involves conscious intent, it is manipulation; if it is spontaneous, it is legitimate.

d) If the behavior is recommended by mainstream dating advice, it is likely ethical; if it is from fringe sources, it is likely manipulation.

Question 7. The autonomy principle, as described in this chapter, states that:

a) Both partners in a courtship have an equal right to initiate and pursue interest.

b) Another person's attractiveness creates no obligation on their part to reciprocate your desire.

c) Individuals have the right to make autonomous choices in courtship, including the choice to use manipulation as a strategy.

d) Autonomy in courtship is constrained by the power differential between parties.

Question 8. Short answer: Explain why "she was sending mixed signals" is a problematic account of why someone continued pursuing interest after receiving what appeared to be soft refusal signals. What does the research on signal interpretation suggest?

Answer in 2–4 sentences.

Question 9. The Okafor-Reyes team's IRB challenge illustrates which of the following about cross-cultural research ethics?

a) Western IRB standards are simply wrong and should be abandoned in international research.

b) Individual informed consent is a value that is not recognized in non-Western cultures.

c) The principles underlying ethical research (respect for persons, protection from harm) are widely shared, but their implementation must be responsive to cultural context.

d) Cross-cultural research is inherently unethical and should be conducted only within single-country samples.

Question 10. The chapter's discussion of racial power dynamics in desire argues that:

a) Individual racial preferences in dating are straightforwardly equivalent to institutional racism and should be legally regulated.

b) Because desire is personal and private, racial patterns in dating preferences fall entirely outside the scope of ethical analysis.

c) Patterns of racialized desirability reflect and reinforce historical power structures, and honest ethical self-examination includes reflection on how those patterns shape one's own preferences.

d) Racial preferences in dating will disappear naturally as societies become more integrated, and require no specific ethical attention.

Question 11. The chapter discusses the ethics of "ghosting" — ceasing all communication without explanation after romantic interest has been expressed. Which position does the chapter take?

a) Ghosting is always unethical and constitutes a violation of the autonomy principle.

b) Ghosting is always acceptable because individuals have no obligation to explain themselves to people they do not wish to pursue.

c) Ghosting is ethically defensible when it protects personal safety, but in the absence of genuine safety concerns, it manages the ghoster's discomfort at the cost of the other person's ability to achieve closure.

d) Ghosting is preferable to explicit rejection because it avoids escalation of conflict.

Question 12. Short answer: The chapter closes with four ethical commitments for courtship. Choose one of these commitments and explain, in your own words, why it follows from the earlier sections of the chapter and how you might apply it in a specific courtship scenario.

Answer in 3–5 sentences.

Answer Key (Instructor Copy)

  1. b — Legal permissibility and ethical adequacy can come apart; the chapter uses this distinction throughout.
  2. c — The core claim is about positive expression vs. absence of protest.
  3. b — Both the practical constraints on refusal and the epistemic bias of the powerful are discussed explicitly.
  4. b — Fiske's power-attention research: less need to attend to others accurately correlates with less actual attendance.
  5. b — Genuine self-development and self-presentation are the paradigm cases of legitimate epistemic action.
  6. b — "Would object if they understood" is the chapter's central manipulation test.
  7. b — The autonomy principle specifically addresses the obligation-creating assumption underlying much entitlement.
  8. Open-ended, but should include: Research shows perceivers systematically over-attribute sexual interest to ambiguous cues; this is especially documented in heterosexual men interpreting women's signals. The pattern is motivated by desire, not neutral reading. The "mixed signals" narrative tends to externalize what is actually an internal interpretive bias.
  9. c — The resolution the team reaches is explicitly principle-universal, implementation-culturally-responsive.
  10. c — The chapter explicitly avoids both equivalencing individual preference to institutional racism and exempting desire from ethical scrutiny.
  11. c — The chapter carves out a safety exception while critiquing the ordinary comfort-driven case.
  12. Open-ended — Assess quality of connection between the commitment chosen and the chapter sections, and specificity of the scenario application.

End of Chapter 5 Quiz