Introduction Scenes

Cut straight to the action. Give backstory gradually, with dialogue, etc. but keep it moving.

No.

I would suggest you not to even think about doing a "lecture" chapter just to set your story. Plunge them right in, and introduce your world when it's necessary -- WITH the story. Your first chapter should have interesting people doing interesting things in interesting places -- how to incorporate that "interesting place" is up to you, but you shouldn't stop the story just to give a seminar on how this universe works.

Now, that said, if you want to have an "INTRODUCTION" or PREFACE in front of the book that is optional, go ahead. No one is going to penalize you for that. And if the readers are inclined to know more about the world before they start the story (or after...), they can. I've seen "introductions" like that before, where the author gets into a bit of details of the settings, time periods, etc. -- sort of a primer, if you will. And that's okay.

But make sure that if your readers do skip that lecture, they're not going to fail the class... so to speak.

IMHO, you should start with a relatively mundane day in the life with very little back ground and a nice spoonful of foreshadowing.

Read Orwell's 84. Might be of help.

You've got fine advice. Readers don't like it when the author spoonfeeds them information. It's going to be a lot more interesting when the reader starts out thinking the story is set in a regular apartment only to find out something is oddly different during the story.

Fade said:

If I have a story that takes place in a very strange setting (say, inside an underground apartment complex from which no resident can leave), and the rules of the society are very different from the norm (say, people have no knowledge of history, and no knowledge that there are other languages besides English, and no knowledge that people outside the complex behave differently and can choose what they want to do)

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Reality TV!

Sorry, bad joke. Abysmal, in fact.

should I give my readers an intro chapter of how the society functions (you know, like a normal day of MC) to let them get used to it, or should I just cut straight to the action?

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Another vote for the consensus so far. A novel can never have too little backstory, in my opinion. Your story will be the more intriguing to a reader if they are actively wondering about why things might be so.

Info dumps kill novels. Show us a scene and fold in background details slowly.

Right to the action, but try to show the rules of your world working so readers can understand it. You usually can do this by choosing details that reflect your world when you describe your setting and write your stage direction. For example, don't mention the carpet if it doesn't do anything a normal carpet doesn't do, but mention there are no windows in the room or that people can feel the cold of the walls from the tons of earth and rock behind them. (not the best examples, but hopefully you get what I mean.)