I found that doing
document.getElementById("select").value = "defaultValue"
wont work.
You must be experiencing a separate bug, as this works fine in this live demo.
And here's the full working code in case you are interested:
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
<title>Demo</title>
<script type="text/javascript">
var selectFunction = function() {
document.getElementById("select").value = "defaultValue";
};
</script>
</head>
<body>
<select id="select">
<option value="defaultValue">Default</option>
<option value="Option1">Option1</option>
<option value="Option2">Option2</option>
</select>
<input type="button" value="CHANGE" onclick="selectFunction()" />
</body>
</html>