The White House is weighing a far broader and more comprehensive approach to curbing the nation’s gun violence than simply reinstating an expired ban on assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition, according to multiple people involved in the administration’s discussions.

A working group led by Vice President Biden is seriously considering measures backed by key law enforcement leaders that would require universal background checks for firearm buyers, track the movement and sale of weapons through a national database, strengthen mental health checks, and stiffen penalties for carrying guns near schools or giving them to minors, the sources said.

To sell such changes, the White House is developing strategies to work around the National Rifle Association that one source said could include rallying support from Wal-Mart and other gun retailers for measures that would benefit their businesses. White House aides have also been in regular contact with advisers to New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg (I), an outspoken gun-control advocate who could emerge as a powerful surrogate for the Obama administration’s agenda.

The Biden group, formed last month after the massacre at a Newtown, Conn., elementary school that killed 20 children and six adults, plans to submit a package of recommendations to President Obama this month. Once Obama’s proposals are set, he plans to lead a public-relations offensive to generate popular support.

“They are very clearly committed to looking at this issue comprehensively,” said Dan Gross, president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, who has been involved in the discussions. The proposals under consideration, he added, are “a deeper exploration than just the assault-weapons ban.”

President Obama has ordered Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. to lead an interagency group to develop a multifaceted response to last week’s mass shooting at a Connecticut school, a White House official said.

Mr. Obama will appear in the White House briefing room alongside Mr. Biden at 11:45 a.m. on Wednesday to announce the assignment but an aide said they will not announce any major policy decisions. Instead, the aide said the president will lay out a process for developing new policies.

The president promised during a speech at a memorial service in Newtown, Conn., on Sunday to “use whatever power this office holds” to prevent more tragedies like the one in which a gunman killed 27 people last Friday, including 20 children. He offered no specific prescriptions; aides have since said that he is looking at tighter gun regulations including a ban on assault weapons and possibly on high-capacity ammunition clips.

But they said he also wants to examine other factors, including the mental health system, education and possibly cultural dynamics, not just gun legislation. “He wants to expand the conversation beyond those specific areas of legislation to look at other ways we can address this problem,” Jay Carney, the White House press secretary, said on Tuesday.

As a senator, Mr. Biden was one of the leading advocates of crime legislation in 1994 that included a ban on assault weapons. The ban generated a furious backlash among gun rights advocates who helped bring down the Democratic Congress in midterm elections later that year. The ban then expired in 2004 with barely a protest as Democrats remained skittish about the issue.