Governmental level

In research on citizens’ trust in government institutions, both theoretical perspectives and empirical research emphasize the significance of the level of government for trust assessment (Kumlin, Reference Kumlin2009; Muñoz, Torcal, & Bonet, Reference Muñoz, Torcal and Bonet2011; Harteveld et al., Reference Harteveld, Van der Meer and De Vries2013; Torcal & Christmann, Reference Torcal and Christmann2019). One argument refers to proximity, with trustors being more likely to trust government institutions that are proximate to them, e.g., national governments (Jennings Reference Jennings, Braithwaite and Levi1998; Denters Reference Denters2002; Citrin & Stoker Reference Citrin and Stoker2018). A second argument refers to identity (see for example Anderson, Reference Anderson1998). Harteveld et al. (Reference Harteveld, Van der Meer and De Vries2013) propose that trust is typically vested in actors and institutions perceived as belonging to the same system of identity, beliefs and shared values – namely national actors rather than EU ‘alien bureaucrats’. Similarly, based on community research and general sociological institutionalism (DiMaggio & Powell, Reference DiMaggio and Powell1983; Scott, Reference Scott2010; Kappler, Reference Kappler2022), Offe (Reference Offe and Warren1999: 59) explores a perspective of general resentment towards the EU. Following these arguments, one may expect generally lower levels of trust in EU-level institutions, compared to national institutions.

When examining congruence and compensation theories on trust in the EU, it becomes apparent that trust in the various governmental levels is interconnected and mutually interdependent (Kumlin, Reference Kumlin2009; Muñoz et al., Reference Muñoz, Torcal and Bonet2011; Armingeon & Ceka, Reference Armingeon and Ceka2014). Levels of trust in EU institutions are mere derivations from trust into national institutions (Muñoz, Reference Muñoz, Zmerli and Van der Meer2017). Essentially, the congruence hypothesis expects a positive relationship between trust in national and EU institutions (Muñoz et al., Reference Muñoz, Torcal and Bonet2011 and similarly in the ‘equal assessments’ model, for example, Anderson, Reference Anderson1998). Trust levels in national institutions, particularly, offer citizens a limited understanding of EU issues – a mere cue or proxy upon which to form attitudes towards EU institutions (Persson et al., Reference Persson, Parker and Widmalm2019).

The compensation hypothesis suggests a negative relationship between trust in national and EU institutions. For example, in the case of low trust into national actors, a trustor tends to place trust in EU-level actors because they provide ‘them with alternative source of – potentially better – governance’ (Harteveld et al. Reference Harteveld, Van der Meer and De Vries2013: 549). Hence, the EU and its actors serve as a lifebuoy, with the EU being perceived as a savior capable of solving problems that the nation state has been unable to address.

We contend that these arguments do not hold in the case of elite actors within regulatory regimes. Not only do different mechanisms come into play, but concepts such as identity and proximity also operate in unique ways. Indeed, Persson et al. (Reference Persson, Parker and Widmalm2019), although focusing on a different empirical context, examined national officials’ levels of trust in EU institutions and found that their trust is not primarily based on connotations and general sentiments associated with governmental levels. Similarly, we contend that dynamics of trust differ substantively when the trustor is an elite regime actor rather than a citizen. We observe significant disparities in terms of knowledge, (direct) experience, identity, and perception of similarity.

Elite regime actors are deeply immersed in and directly impacted by the agency’s work on a daily basis, actively participating in the regulatory process in various capacities (Hoffmann-Lange, Reference Hoffmann-Lange, Best and Higley2018). They gain extensive information about the regulatory agency from multiple sources and are likely to actively seek out additional information. This allows for a more nuanced and less biased understanding of the agency’s actions and conduct. Thus, they possess an ‘awareness and understanding of what is taking place’ (Harteveld et al., Reference Harteveld, Van der Meer and De Vries2013: 548) within EU institutions, even without or only limited interaction with certain institutions. Moreover, being part of the same regime and having insights into the overall functioning provides key actors with information about how it operates.

Building upon Anderson’s (Reference Anderson1998) argument regarding EU complexity, elite actors whose raison d’être is to formulate and shape regulation within a specific (sub-)sector, can reasonably be assumed to possess detailed knowledge of collaborations, their purposes, and outcomes within the regulatory regime. Accordingly, regime actors’ access to information and understanding of regulatory practice is likely to be extensive, thus leading to a more accurate evaluation of trust mirroring the regulatory reality. Therefore, one can reasonably expect a relationship based on interaction and experience between the regime’s constituent actors, particularly with the regulatory agency. From this perspective, trust can be assumed to be developed through involvement, interaction and real experience (Harteveld et al., Reference Harteveld, Van der Meer and De Vries2013). This aligns with the concept of identity-based trust (Lewicki & Bunker, Reference Lewicki, Bunker, Kramer and Tyler1996), which argues that individuals from a specific social category have an understanding of shared norms that is largely built through frequent interaction among members, leading to a general feeling of closeness and perceived (behavioral) similarity (Brewer, Reference Brewer1981).

In general, the logic of (perceived) similarity and shared identity operates differently for elite actors within a regulatory regime. For these actors, an alignment of interests, beliefs and values may not necessarily be rooted in their relationship with the national government but rather among like-minded peers (Gulbrandsen, Reference Gulbrandsen2007), which could extend to other countries or the EU level. Thus, it is less likely (compared to citizens) that trust is primarily tied to the national level due to emotional attachment alone. This is consistent with the concept of epistemic communities, where professionals from various disciplines and backgrounds produce policy-relevant knowledge about complex technical issues, sharing ”normative and principled beliefs” (Haas, Reference Haas1992: 3; also Dunlop, 2011). Through ‘common professional socialization and culture’ (Mavrot & Sager, Reference Mavrot and Sager2018: 394) these communities develop joint social identities that can be ‘supposed to be stronger when they have a long history and when policy actors have regular contact with others sharing the same social identity’ (Hornung et al., Reference Hornung, Bandelow and Vogeler2019: 214). Consequently, it can be assumed that within the regulatory regime where these features are present, the governmental level no longer assumes importance. Emerging communities span the boundaries of the national state, operating vertically in the multilevel system of the EU (Mavrot & Sager, Reference Mavrot and Sager2018).

By delving into these considerations, it is plausible to assume that regulatory regime elites base their trust more substantially on information and experience rather than solely on a sense of attachment to a specific governmental level. Additionally, trust may stem from (perceived) proximity and shared identity, which due to the nature of the regulatory regimes under scrutiny depends less on the governmental level and more on the embeddedness of the elite actors.

Performance matters for trust

Their interaction with other actors within regulatory regimes, involvement in regulatory processes, and eventual experience with regulatory agencies provide both public and private actors within such regimes with specific insights into the agencies’ functioning. This includes aspects such as the staff and other inputs they utilize, their procedures and processes, and the quality of their regulatory decisions, instruments, and other outputs, offering perspectives on different aspects of the agency’s performance. Due to regime actors’ direct experience with the regulatory agency and their knowledge of the regulatory regime and the agencies’ performance, we expect that their assessment of trust in the regulatory agency will not be contingent upon the level of government but will align with the second perspective on trust formation in multilevel systems. This perspective suggests that trust in government institutions depends on a rational evaluation of their performance, irrespective of the government level at which they operate (Muñoz, Reference Muñoz, Zmerli and Van der Meer2017; Persson et al. Reference Persson, Parker and Widmalm2019).

In general, the nexus between regulatory performance and trust can be approached through a virtuous circle (as suggested, for example, by social capital literature, see Fukuyama, Reference Fukuyama1995; Rothstein & Stolle, Reference Rothstein and Stolle2008; Bäck & Kestilä, Reference Bäck and Kestilä2009). As such, trust can drive performance. Trust can be the fuel for, for example, cooperation between actors, compliance and voluntary information flows that is the prerequisite for proper policy-making and highly performative regulation (Bélanger, Reference Bélanger, Zmerli and van der Meer2017; Thomassen et al., Reference Thomassen, Andeweg, Van Ham, Zmerli and van der Meer2017). The other way around, both outcome-oriented and procedural performance can drive trust. The quality of regulation sets the very foundation for trust to occur in the first place by, first, establishing the right setting for cooperation and voluntary flows to flourish and, second, by securing the trustee’s interests to be taken into account, to act according to rules and norms that are deemed appropriate and, finally, to be capable to do the job. All of these aspects decrease vulnerability a trustor faces. While the causal relationship ‘trust leads to performance’ - has received reasonable attention (La Porta et al., Reference La Porta1997; Peters, Reference Peters2009), the opposite relation, ‘performance leads to trust’, is less frequently addressed. Despite being quite intuitive and well established, the idea of performance differences being decisive for trust levels remains a topic rarely discussed, particularly in the context of regulation (Huseby, Reference Huseby2000; Kumlin & Haugsgjerd, Reference Kumlin, Haugsgjerd, Zmerli and van der Meer2017).

However, literature exists on how the overall performance of government institutions or the quality of specific government services (see Kampen et al., Reference Kampen, Van de Walle and Bouckaert2006) drives citizens’ trust. Regarding the relevance of perceived performance for citizen trust in regulatory agencies, studies indicate positive effects (Murphy et al., Reference Murphy, Mazerolle and Bennett2014; Rudolph & Riley, Reference Rudolph and Riley2014) stemming from perceived performance in general, or from more specific aspects of their input (Riley et al., Reference Riley2018), process (Walker & Hills, Reference Walker and Hills2014; Maman et al., Reference Maman, Feldman and Levi-Faur2023), or output-related performance (Driedger et al., Reference Driedger, Mazur and Mistry2014; Rudolph & Riley, Reference Rudolph and Riley2014). Along these lines, we conceptualize the performance of the regulatory agency in line with both the general literature on performance management and the more specific literature on regulatory performance. We propose to understand performance as the emanation of a production process (see Ammons et al., Reference Ammons1999; Pollitt & Bouckaert, Reference Pollitt and Bouckaert2009; Van Dooren et al., Reference Van Dooren, Bouckaert and Halligan2015). In this perspective, performance encompasses the level and quality of input (such as resources, like finances and staff), throughput (activities, processes, and procedures), and outputs (regulatory decisions). Accordingly, as established in the literature on regulatory performance (see Coglianese, Reference Coglianese2012), the performance of regulatory agencies refers to the extent of their success in acquiring and efficiently using appropriate resources, conducting activities and procedures appropriately, making high-quality regulatory decisions aligned with the agencies’ goals.

Actor heterogeneity

Since a regulatory regime cannot be considered as a homogeneous entity, a disaggregated understanding of regulatory elites can be beneficial (Mathieu et al., Reference Mathieu, Verhoest and Matthys2017; Maggetti & Ewert, Reference Maggetti and Ewert2018). Differences between public and private actors in terms of position, interests, and roles can substantively impact the perception of performance and emotional attachments to the governmental level, thus influencing mechanisms of trust assessment.

The bipolar conceptualization of public and private actors as either rule-makers or rule-takers (and cost bearers), and pro-social or for-profit, depicts the two actor groups as natural antagonists (Büthe, Reference Büthe2010). Following these lines, one may argue that the perception of what constitutes performance may vary. While some may argue that private actors are output-driven rather than concerned with in input and throughput, literature, particularly on responsiveness and inclusiveness, makes a clear case for regulatees placing importance on input and procedural aspects as well (Beyers & Arras, Reference Beyers and Arras2021; Blakelock & Turnpenny, Reference Blakelock and Turnpenny2022). Hence, we adopt an inclusive notion of elites that captures the entire regulatory landscape from a comprehensive bird’s-eye perspective. For both actor groups, the perception of the regulatory agencies’ performance can be assumed to be refined, allowing for a nuanced view of various performance aspects. Beyond the perception of performance, the disproportionate burden of regulation borne by public and private actors can lead to differences. While private actors bear the costs of regulation, those on the regulator side are affected to a lesser (direct) extent (Levi-Faur, Reference Levi-Faur and Levi-Faur2011). Accordingly, poorly designed regulation directly impacts regulatees – potentially up to a severely detrimental level. Therefore, it is reasonable to expect private actors to be more sensitive to changes in regulatory performance compared to public actors.

Similarly, the positioning of public actors at the regulatory core and private actors at the regulatory periphery may lead to varying degrees of interaction density impacting both the knowledge level of regulatory processes and the perception of belonging to epistemic communities. Private actors, such as regulated companies, indeed, participate in regulation but are typically expected to have their core business operations situated outside - or at the periphery - of regulatory regimes, firmly anchored in their home countries (Reich et al., Reference Reich, Keller and Pauly2000; Kappler, Reference Kappler2022). Another group of private actors includes national business associations, which may engage more extensively at the EU level compared to their constituent companies. However, according to organizational literature, associations’ autonomy is limited, and they largely pursue the same interests as their member companies. Their close connection to the constituent companies positions them as an aggregate of private corporate actors and they can therefore be assumed to be part of the same community (Beger, Reference Beger and Greenwood2002; Li, Reference Li2023). In contrast, public actors exclusively work in regulation and interact with core regulatory actors at both the EU and the national levels on a daily basis. Hence they can be considered ‘full members’ of the regulatory community, based on shared beliefs and a common identity that transcends governmental levels. The notion of ‘elite unity’ is manifested in various ways: (1) as consensus on significant values or desired properties of society, (2) subjective feelings or perceptions of belonging to the same community, (3) perceptions across different elite groups of being complementary and mutually dependent upon each other, and (4) instances of collective action and cooperation (Gulbrandsen, Reference Gulbrandsen2007: 194).

Hypotheses

Following the discussion on the factors influencing trust assessment, we expect regulatory core actors to assess trust levels in the regulatory agency in a specific manner. Specifically, we hypothesize that regime actors are less likely to rely on emotional attachments or to extend trust to specific governmental levels.

Additionally, we expect elite regime actors to base trust evaluation more rationally on the assessment of regulatory performanceFootnote ² (Harteveld et al., Reference Harteveld, Van der Meer and De Vries2013; Muñoz, Reference Muñoz, Zmerli and Van der Meer2017), irrespective of the level of government to which the agency is affiliated.

Regarding the relationship between the level of government and regulatory performance, we question the proposed interaction effect wherein the ‘relevance of a rational evaluation of an object by its own merits is probably conditional upon one’s emotional attachment’ (Harteveld et al. Reference Harteveld, Van der Meer and De Vries2013, 547). Following Harteveld et al. (Reference Harteveld, Van der Meer and De Vries2013), and applying this to the mechanisms related to regulatory level and performance, one could expect that heightened performance substantively impacts trust levels in the national context and less so in the EU context. Conversely, since ‘love blinds’ (Harteveld et al. Reference Harteveld, Van der Meer and De Vries2013: 547), emotional attachment may render performance more or less irrelevant in the national context. However, considering our suggestion that the governmental level – if at all – has minimal impact in an elite environment, we therefore do not expect any such interaction effect.

As outlined, we anticipate that private actors will be more sensitive to differences in both performance and governmental levels. Firstly, private actors are conceptualized as rule-takers and cost-bearers with relatively low impact on policy-making and implementation. This is exacerbated by their limited access to information on various aspects of regulatory performance compared to regulatory actors. Secondly, being part of the corporate community in their home country rather than the EU regulatory sphere, traditional borders and, thus, varying emotional attachments to governmental levels may be evident.

Therefore, we hypothesize that public and private actors assess trust in core regulatory actors differently:

The experimental design

The survey experiment employs a 2 × 2 between-subjects factorial design. The first treatment differentiates between the level of the regulatory body and distinguishes between EU and national levels. The second treatment differentiates between improvement in regulatory performance and continued poor performance of the regulatory body.

Figure 1 depicts the procedure of the experiment. Firstly, respondents received an instructional text informing them about the general purpose of the experiment, data handling procedures, voluntary participation, guaranteed anonymity, and the fictional nature of the experiment.Footnote ⁵ In the second step, respondents were randomly assigned four vignettes (see an example vignette in the online Appendix), each containing unique combinations of regulatory performance and regulatory level. Every vignette portrays a scenario in which a regulatory body at either the EU level or the national level faces criticism from an independent evaluation committee, addressing various performance elements (input, throughput, and output). The scenarios depicted in the vignettes were then subject to either ‘improvement’ or ‘no improvement’, as determined by a re-evaluation conducted by the committee a few years later. Finally, all respondents received post-test questions regarding their trust in the regulatory agency.

Figure 1. Processing of experiment.

Source: Own compilation.

Variables

Treatment variables follow the factorial design introduced above. Each treatment is represented by binomial variables. The regulatory level distinguishes between the EU level and the national level. Therefore, using contextual cues, the agency is described as either a national- or EU-level agency. Regulatory performance is operationalized according to the theoretical argument formulated earlier. Performance is built on a triad of (a) input, which we approach by the agency’s ability to recruit highly qualified staff; (b) throughput, described irregularities in procurement procedures and (c) output, entailing the quality of regulatory decisions, such as an overly strict application of rules that does not consider different companies’ characteristics. The treatment variable distinguishes between high performance, indicating performance improvement, and low performance, indicating non-improvement.

Our dependent variable, trust is assessed using a well-accepted and well-tested item (Luo, Reference Luo2005; Kääriäinen & Sirén, Reference Kääriäinen and Sirén2012: 281; OECD, 2017). Trust evaluation is based on respondents’ answers to a general question regarding how much they trust the regulatory agency on an eleven-point Likert scale ranging from ‘not at all’ to ‘completely’. This generic approach to trust reflects the general willingness to cooperate with the agency, even without personal acquaintance. Additionally, for robustness checks, we operationalized an alternative dependent trust variable proposed by Mayer et al. (Reference Mayer, Davis and Schoorman1995), considering trustworthiness based on trustee’s perceived ability, benevolence, and integrity - i.e. ABI-aspects - as a multi-dimensional concept (Lewicki & Bunker, Reference Lewicki, Bunker, Kramer and Tyler1996; Six & Verhoest, Reference Six, Verhoest, Six and Verhoest2017; Grimmelikhuijsen et al., Reference Grimmelikhuijsen2020).

To address the internal heterogeneity of the regulatory regime, we consider actor types, specifically respondents’ group affiliations representing either public or consumer interests (labeled as ‘public actors’ below) or the regulatee interests (‘private actors’). Accordingly, regulatees and related national interest groups are assigned to the latter group, while all other actors are grouped under the former.

Furthermore, we incorporate a variable to control for potential (distorting) transpositions of the image the respondents hold from her - mostly gained as citizens - ‘real’ national energy regulator over the evaluation of trust in the experiment. To achieve this, we use import-export data from 2016 to 2018 obtained from the International Energy Agency. We categorize countries into two groups: those demonstrating good performance if they are net exporters and those exhibiting bad performance if they are net importers (IEA, 2023). Additionally, to account for country-specific effects that may influence citizen’s trust in local institutions, we introduce a dichotomous variable that categorizes respondents based on whether they hail from a high-trust or low-trust country, utilizing the latest European Social Survey data (2023).

Sample

In total, 752 elite regime actors participated in the experiment, marking it as the largest dataset covering the inner circle of regulatory regimes in the EU. Consistent with the comprehensive regulatory regime approach outlined earlier, we included a diverse range of regime actors. Our dataset comprised executive bodies, regulatees, regulatory agencies and business associations, each representing between 17 − 22 % of respondents. Additionally, legislative bodies and regulatory intermediaries accounted for 7 − 10 % of respondents. Ombudsmen, trade unions, and consumer associations followed representing approximately 3–5 %. The respondents originated from Belgium (24.92 %), Spain (11.38 %), Denmark (17.98 %), Germany (22.54 %), the Netherlands (9.75 %), and Poland (13.43 %). In terms of gender, roughly 62 % identified as male, 37 % as female, and 1 % as other. The age distribution showed a significant concentration of respondents between 36 and 65 years with peaks in the ‘46–55 years’ and ‘56–65 years’ age groups. Regarding respondents’ affiliation with either the ‘public sector’ or the ‘private sector’, 65.7 % identified as belonging to the former, while 34.3 % identified with the latter. Thus, our sample effectively captures the internal heterogeneity of regulatory regimes. Regarding the individual treatment groups, balance tests revealed no substantive differences concerning the variables discussed.

Do performance and governmental levels matter?

We employ a between-subjects design to address the following questions: (1) Is there a difference in average trust levels based on differences in the governmental level (main effect, independent of differences in performance)? (2) Is there a difference in average trust levels based on performance differences (main effect, independent of differences in governmental level)? (3) Is there an interaction effect between performance differences and governmental levels?

To approach questions (1) and (2), we utilize independent-samples t-tests to determine whether trust levels in the regulatory agency differ between two groups (e.g., national or EU governmental level). Robustness checks are conducted using Mann-Whitney U tests and are mentioned only in cases of deviation.

In the subsequent analysis, data are presented as mean ± standard deviation. Overall, 381 respondents assessed trust in the regulatory agency at the EU level, while 370 assessed it at the national level. We found homogeneity of variances for trust levels in both the EU and national groups, as assessed by Levene’s test for equality of variances (p = 0.091). Trust levels were normally distributed for both governmental levels, as confirmed by visual inspection of Normal Q-Q plots. Within our sample, mean trust levels were slightly higher in the national group (5.84 ± 2.089) than in the EU one (5.68 ± 1.906), with a difference of 0.158 (95% CI, −0.1283 to 0.444). However, the difference in mean trust levels is very small and not statistically significant, t(749) = 1.084, p = 0.279, d = 0.08.

Thus, Hypothesis 1 can be accepted. The governmental level, if it plays a role at all, has only a minor influence when regime actors assess trust in the regulatory agency within our sample. Concerning the broader population, we cannot observe differences in trust assessment among regime actors that are related to the governmental level.

Following the same rationale, we examined whether variations in performance (high and low) impact regime actors’ assessment of trust in the agency. A total of 379 respondents received treatment indicating an improvement in regulatory performance, while 372 respondents received the treatment indicating constant poor performance by the regulatory agency. We identified homogeneity of variances for trust levels for the EU and the national groups, as assessed by Levene’s test for equality of variances (p = 0.474). Trust levels were normally distributed for both national and EU governmental levels, as assessed by visual inspection of Normal Q-Q plots. Mean trust levels were higher in the high-performance group (6.32 ± 1.882) compared to the low-performance group (5.18 ± 1.950), representing a difference of 1.144 (95% CI, 0.87 to 1.42). The difference in mean trust levels was statistically significant, t(749) = 8.183, p < 0.005, d = 0.6.

Consequently, Hypothesis 2 can also be accepted. Regulatory performance substantively influences regime actors’ trust in the regulatory agency. Furthermore, controlling for various country-specific patterns, including citizen-related trust levels and experience with the ‘actual’ electricity sector, demonstrates stable effects of our independent variables of interest (see online Appendix).

Figure 2 illustrates the mean trust levels of regime actors in the regulatory agency (y-axis) at the basic level of further interest, that is per treatment group, each of which comprised roughly of 190 respondents. Upon initial visual inspection, the abovementioned findings are corroborated. Regardless of the governmental level differentiation, maintaining consistent performance measures appears to yield similar trust levels across treatment groups. Notably, at both EU and national governmental levels, substantive differences in trust levels are evident when performance disparities are considered.

Figure 2. Mean trust levels per treatment group ordered by governmental level and performance.

Source: Own compilation.

Considering the interaction effects between performance and the governmental levels on trust in the regulatory agency, we conducted two-way analysis of variance (ANOVA). Residual analysis was performed to test relevant assumptions. Data were found to be normally distributed, as assessed by visual inspection of Normal Q-Q plots. Homogeneity of variances was confirmed through Levene’s test for equality of variances (p = 0.090). Following the absence of a governmental level effect, we observed no statistically significant interaction between performance and governmental levels concerning trust level scores, F(1, 747), F = 0.285, p = 0.594, partial η² = 0.000.

Therefore, we can accept Hypothesis 3, as both performance and governmental levels do not significantly interact. In empirical terms, performance similarly influences trust levels across different levels of governmental action.

For robustness checks, all tests were replicated using the multi-dimensional variable of perceived trustworthiness (Six & Verhoest, Reference Six, Verhoest, Six and Verhoest2017; Grimmelikhuijsen et al., Reference Grimmelikhuijsen2020) as the dependent variable. All results were confirmed, indicating that general trust and ABI-based trust were very similar. This finding supports existing literature that sometimes treats the two terms synonymously.

Does trust assessment vary between public and private regime actors?

To account for the internal heterogeneity of the regulatory regime, we conducted two two-way ANOVAs to examine whether the effects of performance and governmental levels differ between public and private actor respondents. We found no statistically significant interaction between governmental level and actor type regarding trust levels in the regulatory agency, F(1,747) = 0.002, p = 0.967, η² = 0.000. Along similar lines, no significant interaction between performance differences and actor type were observed, F(1,747) = 0.049, p = 0.824, η² = 0.000. Thus, the mechanisms that translate performance differences and governmental level into trust levels appear to function equally among both public and private actors.

To assess whether public and private actors differ in their trust assessment of the regulator (rather than examining whether actor type interacts with treatments), we tested the main effect of actor type on trust. A statistically significant main effect of actor type on trust levels in the regulatory agency was found, F(1, 747) = 12.5079, p < 0.001, partial η² = 0.016. The marginal means for trust level in the regulatory agency were 5.938 ± 0.087 for those representing public and consumer interests, and 5.426 ± 0.115 for respondents representing regulatees’ interests – indicating a statistically significant mean difference of 0.512 (95 % CI, 0.210 to 0.769), p < 0.001. Therefore, there is a slightly higher overall assessment of trust in the regulatory agency among public actors compared to private actors, irrespective of the experimental treatment. However, since neither governmental level nor performance is moderated by actor type, we reject Hypothesis 4. Both independent variables of interest demonstrate stable effects across public and private actor respondents.