Document Based Question
Document Based Questions (DBQs) require students to evaluate and interpret primary sources to answer a question. They form part of many history examinations. DBQs have been included in History Study Center for some of the most commonly studied topics. These will open in PDF format (in a new window) and each one features a number of carefully selected primary source extracts to be used in answering the question.
- To what extent did existing doctrines of discovery influence the European colonization of the Americas?
- To what extent had the early colonists developed a sense of unity as Americans prior to the Revolutionary War of 1776?
- How far do you agree that President Jackson did consider the well being of the Indian peoples during the period of removal?
- Why did the issue of slavery aggravate relations between the north and south from 1830?1860?
- To what extent was the election of Abraham Lincoln responsible for the outbreak of Civil War in America in 1861?
- Did the Confederacy ever have a realistic chance of winning the American Civil War?
- What did 'freedom' really mean during the period of Reconstruction?
- How important was the role of American capitalism in driving western expansion in the United States?
- Explain the reasons why the United States joined the war against Germany in April 1917
- How far do you agree that President Hoover?s 'Noble Experiment' with Prohibition was a failure?
- To what extent had the New Deal succeeded in revitalising the American economy before the start of the Second World War?
- Why, in the aftermath of the Second World War, was United States foreign policy dominated by the necessity to contain the spread of Communism?
- To what extent did Communist agitation pose a genuine threat to American domestic security during the post-war years?
- How far do you agree that a lack of unified ideology between the leaders of the Black Civil Rights groups hindered the progress?
- How did the Reformation in England under Henry VIII differ from the German Reformation?
- To what extent did the industrial revolution improve the lives of women in Britain?
- Why did Britain go to war on August 4, 1914?
- How far do you agree that the British government deliberately set out to mislead the public on the realities of life in the First World War trenches?
- Why was France on the brink of revolution in 1789?
- Explain why the European powers scrambled to colonize Africa in the nineteenth century?
- Why were the Bolsheviks able to seize power in October 1917?
- How far do you agree that the League of Nations was destined to fail from the very start?
- How did Germany?s economic problems after the First World War contribute to the rise of the Nazi Party?
- Why did Stalin sign a pact with Germany rather than with Britain and France in 1939?
