I'm curious if anyone who knows more about polling and psychology than I can shed any light on a question I have. Why is it that poll numbers fluctuate so much from poll to poll? More specifically, why is it that people are so willing to change their minds from one poll to the next based on one specific event? I'm specifically thinking here of the small uptick that Bush seems to have had following the Zarqawi death? We always seem to see these sorts of upticks following specific events like this. My question is why?
I'm the sort of person that pretty much doesn't change my mind from day to day on whether I think a politico is a jackass. If I think someone sucks bad enough to tell a pollster I don't approve of them, I'm sure as hell not going to change my mind because of one little thing to the point where I love them the next day.
I realize that the same people are not being polled during each poll. I also realize that most people are pretty casual news / politics followers. However, these shifting poll numbers clearly show that opinions change based on events. How and why does this happen?
Anybody have any light to shed on this issue?