Feeling represented yet? How populist and non-populist cues in references to the people affect people’s perceived representation

In their aim to illustrate their responsiveness to the people, politicians utilize appeals to the people in their communication strategy. While invoking the people is traditionally associated with the context of populism, the use of references to the people is used by politicians across the ideological spectrum. Yet, the effect this has on people’s perceived representation remains unexplored. We combine theories of representation with those of people-centrism in political communication, testing the effect of populist and non-populist cues in references to the people on citizens’ perception of representation. In a first experiment, we test respondents’ perceived representation after being exposed to one of four types of cues in people-centric communication (neutral, pluralist, nationalist, oppositional). A second vignette study replicates and supplements the experiment by adding party cues and sources of information to the stimuli, simulating a more externally valid setting. Results from the experiment show that respondents felt more represented following statements with populist cues. Taking party preference into account, results from the vignette study show that these effects held when the messages came from parties that the respondents favored while respondents reading messages from parties they did not like reported no significant differences between conditions. Respondents also indicated lower levels of perceived representation if politicians from a party they did not favor claimed direct conversations with the people as a source for knowing the people’s will. These results serve as important evidence for the mechanisms at play in the relationship between responsiveness and democratic representation.