ANES 1994 Time Series Study

Résumé 0

This study is part of a time-series collection of national surveys fielded continuously since 1952. The election studies are designed to present data on Americans' social backgrounds, enduring political predispositions, social and political values, perceptions and evaluations of groups and candidates, opinions on questions of public policy, and participation in political life. The 1994 National Election Study is a post-election interview in which approximately 42 percent of the cases are comprised of empaneled respondents first interviewed in AMERICAN NATIONAL ELECTION STUDY, 1992: PRE- AND POST-ELECTION SURVEY [ENHANCED WITH 1990 AND 1991 DATA] (ICPSR 6067) and later in AMERICAN NATIONAL ELECTION STUDY: 1992-1993 PANEL STUDY ON SECURING ELECTORAL SUCCESS/1993 PILOT STUDY (ICPSR 6264). The other 58 percent of the cases are a freshly drawn cross-section sample. The panel component of the study is designed to exploit the special features of the 1992-1994 elections: a minority president struggling to forge a majority coalition in the face of a strong third-party challenge, and the replacement in 1992 of fully one-quarter of the House of Representatives. Coming at the end of this period, the 1994 National Election Study provides insights into how electoral coalitions form and decay, and how members of the House who were newly-elected in 1992 secured -- or did not secure -- their districts. The design themes became especially salient in the aftermath of the November 8 election, when control of the Congress shifted to the Republican Party for the first time since 1952. Survey questions included the now-standard National Election Studies battery of congressional evaluations supplemented by questions on term limits, the respondent's representative's vote on President Bill Clinton's crime bill, and whether the respondent felt that his or her representative cared more about prestige and influence for himself/herself than about solving the problems of the congressional district. The content for the 1994 Election Study reflects its dual purpose, both as the traditional presidential election year time-series data collection and as the third wave of a panel study. In addition to the standard demographic items, respondents were asked their positions on the following substantive themes: interest in the campaign, media exposure, presidential performance evaluation, measures of partisanship (party likes/dislikes and party identification), which party would better handle certain public problems, summary evaluations (feeling thermometers) on major political figures and social groups, and recent voting behavior. Respondents were also asked their views on issues such as defense spending, assistance to Blacks, the trade-off between spending and services, health insurance, the role of women, recent proposals to reform welfare, preferences on federal budget allocations, and evaluations of retrospective and prospective national and personal economic trends. They were also queried on the extent of their participation in the campaign and their values regarding egalitarianism, attitudes toward race, school prayer, and abortion.