The Polls: The Components of Presidential Favorability

Abstract

This article uses a February 1997 Gallup Poll to address at the individual level the connections between presidential job approval and favorability as well as to look at the sources of favorable attitudes toward the president. The analysis found that an overwhelming number of people hold consistent and favorable job performance assessments of the president. However, sources of inconsistency, in which a person might view the president favorably but disapprove of his job (or visa versa), are not randomly distributed. The analysis also looked at factors that may structure people's favorability toward the president, focusing on presidential traits. While one can conceptually organize the traits into two sets that one can distinguish as character and competence, the public seems not to make such a distinction, lumping all into one set.