Rational opinion

The contention of the authors of The Rational Public: Fifty Years of Trends in Americans’ Policy Preferences is that the collective policy preferences of Americans as expressed over time in opinion surveys are predominantly rational in the sense the authors’ define: real (not meaningless, random "non-attitudes"), generally stable, are coherent and consistent, they make sense in terms of underlying values and available information, that changes are usually understandable and, indeed, predictable reacting in consistent ways to changes in circumstances and they are generally sensible adjustments to the same.

In doing so, they are at some odds with a long tradition of dismissing popular opinion by pointing to low levels of knowledge and instability between different polls.  The most important counterpoint the authors make is to point out the importance of the collective nature of opinions – which is well in accordance with the burgeoning research on the wisdom of crowds.

There is a…