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Congressional Actions And Public Reactions., Jason Gainous

Faculty Scholarship

This paper explores the link between congressional actions and public attitudes about government responsiveness, public efficacy, and public trust in government. Congressional actions are moves by members of Congress that are potentially consequential to public opinion. The theory contends that actions taken by Congress influence these perspectives on government within an alert stratum of the public. This relationship is demonstrated by employing a pooled time-series logistical regression modeling data that come from the American National Election Studies merged with historical actions data. The findings support the contention that increased actions by Congress increase public efficacy and trust in government, and …