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Disentangling Trust and Perceived Trustworthiness? Towards a More Differentiated Analysis of Trust

Anna Almakaeva (Higher School of Economics)
Nicolas Griesshaber (European Central Bank)

Keywords: Comparative research

Abstract

A large body of studies provides vast but mixed evidence on the determinants of generalized trust and their causal relations. The first and most obvious explanation for such inconsistency is that scholars often use different datasets and methods of analysis. The second and more profound explanation concerns the issue of how generalized trust is conceptualized and measured. The traditional trust question asking about trust in most people utilized in the greater part of existing surveys has been criticized over last decade. The most often raised critique concerns the fact that it has been taken for granted that the notion «most people» refers to strangers and members of out-groups. Yet, recent studies demonstrate that this is not necessarily the case (Sturgis & Smith, 2010; Reeskens 2012; Delhey, Newton, and Welzel 2011). While the trust radius is a widely pronounced limitation, there has been little discussion about another, similarly important aspect. Instead of capturing trust and distrust, the traditional question might rather evaluate the perceived trustworthiness of the general social environment of a person (Nannestad, 2008 Helliwell & Putnam, 2004) and caution (Miller & Mitamura, 2003). Country specific evidence on the US and Japan shows a gap between indicators of trust and perceived trustworthiness (Miller & Mitamura, 2003).
To this date, corresponding cross-cultural evidence on this gap, as well as, its detailed exploration in terms of micro and macro-foundations is inexistent. Utilizing the 5th wave of the WVS, we combine traditional trust question and question about trust in strangers differentiating four possible types: a) Trusting the trustworthy b) not trusting the trustworthy c) trusting the untrustworthy and d) not trusting the untrustworthy. Descriptive analyses thereby indicate that trust and trustworthiness do not necessarily mirror each other perfectly. IN addition, CFA indeed indicates that these two questions hardly belong to the same dimension.
Such discrepancy is not only an issue of measurement. Thorough investigation may shed additional light on the concepts of «trust», «trustworthiness» and help to differentiate «rational» and «norm-driven» or «moral» trust (Ashraf, Bohnet, & Piankov, 2006; Mansbridge, 1999; Nannestad, 2008; Nooteboom, 2002; Stolle, 2002). «Rational» approach is based on the calculation of possible losses and gains and implies uncertainty, risk and caution. «Norm-driven» approach sees trust as a default attitude which lies in the commonality of moral values and norms. Following this idea trusting the untrustworthy reflects rational trust, while trusting the trustworthy moral. To test this hypothesis we conduct multilevel regression analysis demonstrated that these types have different foundations.
Using Schwartz` values and a set of important variables, we found that those who have higher level of universalism, protest participation and confidence in political institutions are more likely to have «norm-driven» trust. The evidence for trusting the untrustworthy is mixed. We detected no statistically significant difference between trusting the trustworthy and trusting the untrustworthy in relation to stimulation/risk taking. Therefore, the act of trusting implies a certain amount of risk no matter of the perceived trustworthiness of possible partners.