How flexible are our opinions on issues? My feeling is that as long as I am educated on an issue, know the in’s and out’s, my opinion is fairly difficult to change on a short time-scale (several months, definitely less than 2 years). However, when I feel uninformed about a topic, I tend not to have any opinions either way, and wait to become informed before I make a decision.

So I ask this in light of several sessions I attended today regarding influencing public policy as scientists, and specifically convincing our Congressmen/women to vote in favor of not cutting NIH funding. As someone who doesn’t even feel comfortable talking about an issue about on which I am uninformed, I cannot possibly imagine the position of being a Congresswomen having to vote on issues that have nothing to do with me directly, but which I must carry an opinion in order to vote and affect the overall course of life in these United States.

Thus, the job of being a Congressional staff member seems incredibly hard. Congressmen/women rely on these folks to inform them to the point that they feel comfortable voting in Congress for/against bills. But do they ever feel entirely comfortable voting in those situations?

We were told today that our letters and phone calls to these folks’ offices can influence their opinions and their ultimate courses of voting. But in the end, do these Congressmen vote because their constituents convinced them one way or another? Or because they already had personal opinions on these topics? When we vote these people into Congress, do we vote for them based on how likely we think we can influence their opinions during their tenure? Or do we vote for them based on our personal confidence in their integrity and the likelihood of their views aligning with our own?