Politicians were evaluated as to their respect for the citizenry and for their opponents, whether they made campaign promises that they did not intend to keep, and whether politicians would pay more attention to people like the respondent if elections were held more often. Demographic variables include gender, race, employment status, and length of residency in the community. They are based on multistage representative cross-section samples of citizens of voting age, living in private households. Each study contains information from interviews conducted with 1,000 to 2,000 respondents. Interviewing is conducted before and after presidential elections and after occasional congressional elections.
Interviews range from one to three hours in length.
Many questions are replicated across studies, although each has questions not asked in the others. The 2000 pilot study includes all variables from the 1998 interview. The PDF file format was developed by Adobe Systems Incorporated and can be accessed using PDF reader software, such as the Adobe Acrobat Reader. United States citizens of voting age residing in housing units other than on military reservations in the 48 coterminous states.