does not accurately reflect the federalnsituation, is interesting, but, at best,nonly mildly surprising. It is the statenand local bureaucracies with whichnpeople have the most daily experience,nexperience that leads them to correctlynbelieve that bureaucracy in general hasnincreased significantly.nQ. Exposure to pornography makesnpeople more likely to commit sexncrimes?nA. Studies of sex offenders show thatnthey are less likely than non-offendersnto have been exposed to pornography.nFar from encouraging sex crime, pornographynseems to provide some peoplenwith an alternative outlet.nComment: The answer does notnaddress, much less refute, the question.nIt addresses the issue of the relativenexposure to pornography of offendersnand non-offenders. The issue describednin the question — the issue ofnthe causal role of pornography — isnthis: do offenders who read pornographyncommit a greater number (or thensame number or fewer) crimes than donoffenders who do not read pornographyn(or who read less pornography)?nThat the non-offender, who perhapsnlacks a necessary condition that mustncomplement pornography if one is ton become an offender, reads as muchnpornography as the offender (or evennmore) is irrelevant. One would notndeny that curry makes an ulcer worsensimply because curry will not give annulcer to one who lacks the other necessarynconditions for the development ofnan ulcer.nQ. One thing that is found in everynsociety is romantic love?nA. Romantic love may seem a partnof “human nature” to us, but in manynsocieties it is unknown and in manynothers it is regarded as ridiculous orntragic.nComment: The issue raised in thenquestion is whether there are societiesnin which romantic love is unknownn(not whether there are societies innwhich it is negatively sanctioned). Thatnsome societies ridicule romantic love ornsee it as tragic demonstrates that thesensocieties do recognize romantic love.nThat many societies do not institutionalizenromantic love (seeing it as anthreat to social stability) is a point thatnis true, important, and probably unknownnby most students. However, thentest question is not concerned withnsocieties that recognize romantic lovenand negatively sanction it, but withnalleged societies that are so successfulnat socializing their members that romanticnlove never rears its head.nI have spent the past decade and anhalf studying cross-cultural regularities,nand like many others I have come tonstrongly distrust claims of the absencenin a society of an emotionally rootednbehavior that is found in every othernsociety. Such claims are almost invariablynmade on the basis of secondhandnreferences. When one looks to thenethnographies of societies said to lack ancertain kind of behavior (in those casesnwhere the sources are given), the descriptionnof those societies makes itnclear that the behavior is not absent.nOn a very few occasions, a specializednethnography concentrating on an entirelyndifferent subject will give nonevidence of the behavior in question.nHowever, when the behavior is negativelynsanctioned (and therefore notnexhibited openly), when the subject ofnthe ethnography is, say, irrigationnmethods, and the behavior in questionnis romantic love — and when we knownthat this behavior can be observed innvirtually all other of the world’s societies,nit is dubious to conclude thatnabsence of a mention of the behaviornin the ethnography is strong evidencenthat members of the society do notnexhibit the behavior.nQ. On average, high-income peoplenin the United States pay a greaternproportion of their income in taxesnthan low-income people?nA. High-income people pay roughlynthe same proportion of their income asnlow-income people do. The reasonsnare that the rich can use many taxnloopholes and that sales and othernindirect taxes take a relatively largernpercentage of poor people’s income.nComment: There are two problemsnwith this answer, even if wenaccept that it is empirically correct.nFirst, if my students are representative,nand I suspect they are, then mostnstudents do not only not register surprisenat the answer, but in fact arensurprised that the rich don’t pay ansmaller percentage of their incomesnbecause they can buy lawyers who cannfind loopholes and because the systemnfavors the rich. Second, even if thenstudents did believe that the rich pay anhigher percentage, their belief wouldnnnbe a function of their equating “taxes”nwith income taxes, not the sales andnindirect taxes required to make thisnquestion “work.”nQ. Husbands are more likely to killntheir wives in family fights than wivesnare to kill their husbands?nA. Husbands and wives are equallynlikely to kill one another; althoughnhusbands are usually stronger, wivesnare more likely to resort to lethal weapons.nComment: This certainly is a surprisingn”fact,” one that will surprisenstudents as much as will the “fact” thatnthere are more Chinese in New Jerseynthan there are in China. These twon”facts,” however, have about equalntruth content. According to a recentnFBI Uniform Crime Report, husbandsnkill their wives about three times asnoften as wives kill their husbands.nQ. The amount of money spent onna school’s equipment and facilities hasna strong effect on the academic successnof its pupils?nA. The amount of money spent onna school’s facilities seems to have littleninfluence on pupil achievement. Performancenis primarily related to familynand social class background.nComment: One might questionnwhether the student is all that surprisednby the answer. The cynic might havendoubts whether the research on whichnthe answer is based possessed thenmethodological sophistication and rigornnecessary for disentangling the factorsnof income, social class, and thentendency of schools with high-incomenstudents to both spend more moneynand achieve academic success. Nonetheless,nit takes only the slightest generositynto give this question a passingngrade.nQ. A substantial portion of peoplenon welfare could work if they reallynwanted to?nA. Less than 2 percent of people onnwelfare are adult males who have beennout of work for several months. Nearlynall are children, old people, handicappednpeople, or mothers who arenobliged to stay at home to look afterntheir families and have no other sourcenof income.nComment: If we ignore possiblenquibbles about precise percentages, thisnanswer is correct in its claim that mostnpeople on welfare are in the groupsnlisted. For some students, the questionnMARCH 1991/57n