How Do Americans Influence Political Developments?

According to Patterson (2013), “Americans’ political opinions are shaped by several frames of reference, including partisanship, ideology, and group attachments” (p. 144). Partisanship, or party identification, describes loyalty to a political party. Most Americans identify with a political party; even those who label themselves “Independent” admit that they “lean toward one party or the other and usually vote for that party’s candidates” (Patterson, 2013, p. 148). Ideology also influences the way Americans view political developments. Ideology is a general belief about the role of government (Patterson, 2013). The third method Americans use to evaluate political developments is group orientation. These “groups” include religion, economic class,

geographic region, race, ethnicity, gender, age, and more (Patterson, 2013).
With a policy like ObamaCare, a person might use partisanship, ideology, and group attachments to figure out where they stand on the program. Congressional support for the passage of ObamaCare was (and continues to be) split along party lines: Democrats largely support ObamaCare, and Republicans do not. Therefore, a person who identifies as a Republican is likely to come to the conclusion that he is against ObamaCare. A person might also use their ideology to oppose ObamaCare: people who generally believe the role of government should be limited are unlikely to support government-mandated health care. Finally, the groups a person belongs to might influence their opinion of ObamaCare. People who already had health insurance are less supportive of the program than people who lacked insurance, and women have a more favorable view than men (Kaiser Health Tracking Poll: The Public’s Views on the ACA, 2015), to give two examples. Most people would probably use a combination of these three methods to come to a conclusion about ObamaCare.