Persistence and Change in Elite and Mass Attitudes toward U.S. Foreign Policy

Public opinion analysts have found it difficult to document the kind of attitude changes that they have expected to find since the Vietnam War. Is it possible that reorientations in belief have occurred, and we simply do not have a yardstick capable of measuring conceptual or cultural change? Using concepts from the literature on planned-change, the authors define gamma change as a change in state and demonstrate that gamma change in public attitudes on foreign policy did occur between 1974 and 1978 and again between 1982 and 1986. No gamma change is found in elite attitudes at the same points in time.