Trust in government and digital civic engagement: a moderation analysis of behavioral intentions and actions

Purpose This study examines how trust in government conditions the theory of planned behavior (TPB) pathways linking psychosocial antecedents to digital civic engagement intention and behavior. Design/methodology/approach Using the 2022 Digital Divide Survey of Korea (N = 6,632), this study employs structural equation modeling and multi-group comparisons using a satisfaction-based proxy for institutional confidence to test moderation within a TPB-informed model. Findings Attitude, online social interaction, and perceived behavioral control are positively associated with digital civic engagement intention, which is positively associated with enacted digital engagement. The strongest moderation evidence concerns the intention–behavior pathway: the association is stronger in the higher trust-proxy group and remains evident when the original 4-point satisfaction item is modeled continuously, behavior is specified as binary and behavioral residual variance is constrained across groups. Online social interaction–intention moderation appears only in the dichotomous multi-group model and is not reproduced when satisfaction is modeled continuously. Neither attitude–intention nor perceived behavioral control–intention moderation is supported. Practical implications Trust-sensitive participation systems − through transparent feedback, responsiveness, and privacy safeguards − may facilitate intention-to-action conversion on government platforms, where enacted participation remains low despite broad digital access. Originality/value The study advances a conditional TPB account of digital civic engagement by theorizing trust in government as an institutional boundary condition in intention-to-action conversion. It also contextualizes the social component of a TPB-informed model by incorporating online social interaction as a relational antecedent of intention.