Rank choice voting, explained by CNN using ice cream

This one is for all of my psychometric instructors.

CNN created an engaging, interactive website to explain rank choice voting using ice cream flavor preference. It was created due to the 2025 NYC mayoral primaries, but uses ice cream instead of humans to make for a good explainer that may have a home in your classroom.

https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2025/06/politics/ranked-choice-voting-explained-dg/

First, you rank order your top five favorite ice cream flavors out of a field of ten.

Then, you can view all users' ranking data, and see how the distribution changes when the least popular flavor, Rocky Road, is eliminated and the rocky road voters' votes are redistributed.

The vote relocation goes on and on...

Finally, you get to see the winner, chocolate.

Rank choice voting is one of those concepts that is way, way easier to explain with a bit of animation and a very simple premise. I couldn't capture it in my screenshots, but the flavor elimination and redistribution are animated. It is a little thing, but it really helps explain the concept.

If you like this example and would love to see a WHOLE textbook filled with these sorts of examples, go check out my textbook, Psychological Statistics for Everyone: https://wwnorton.com/books/9781324102052/for-instructors

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