High Interpersonal Trust Research Articles

The ‘dark side’ of social capital: trust and self-rated health in European countries

Generalized interpersonal trust (as an indicator of social capital) has been linked to health status at both the individual and ecological level. We sought to examine how changes in contextual and individual trust are associated with changes in self-rated health in the European Social Surveys 2002-12. A multilevel analysis using a variance components model was performed on 203 452 individuals nested within 145 country cohorts covering 35 countries. Conditional on sociodemographic covariates, we sought to examine the association between self-rated health and individual trust, country average trust and a cross-level interaction between the two. Although individual trust perceptions were significantly correlated with self-rated health [OR = 0.95, 95% confidence interval (0.94-0.96)], country-level trust was not associated [OR = 1.12, 95% confidence interval (0.95-1.32)]. There was, however, a strong crosslevel interaction between contextual and individual trust (P < 0.001), such that individuals with high interpersonal trust reported better health in contexts in which other individuals expressed high average interpersonal trust. Conversely, low trust individuals reported worse health in high trust contexts. Our findings suggest that contexts with increasing average trust can be harmful for low trust individuals, which might reflect the negative impact that social capital can have in certain groups. These findings suggest that contextual trust has a complex role in explaining health inequalities and individual self-rated health.

Does social distrust always lead to a stronger support for government intervention?

The paper considers ‘trust’ as an empirical determinant of individual support for government intervention. The central notion is that the influence of generalized trust on policy attitudes is conditional on confidence in both state actors and major companies. The starting point is the idea that individuals who generally distrust other persons have a stronger taste for the regulation of economic activities, while people with high interpersonal trust are in favor of less stringent regulatory control. Yet, people who do not trust unknown others also tend to mistrust government and private companies. If mistrust in state actors dominates, we should not necessarily expect stronger interventionist preferences. Estimating the determinants of interventionist attitudes using data from the World Values Survey/European Values Study for approximately 130,000 individuals in forty OECD- and EU-countries, we find evidence that the impact of social trust on government intervention attitudes is conditional on institutional trust. Confidence in major companies appears to have a stronger effect on preference formation than trust in state actors.

Catching the liar as a matter of justice: Effects of belief in a just world on deception detection accuracy and the moderating role of mortality salience

Belief in a just world has been linked to high interpersonal trust and less suspicion of deception. We therefore predicted people with a strong dispositional belief in a just world to have low motivation to accurately detect deception. Accordingly, we hypothesized such a belief to be negatively related to accuracy in deception detection. Furthermore, research on Terror Management Theory has indicated that culturally shared values, such as justice, become more important after mortality salience. Thus, we assumed engaging in justice concerns after a death threat is especially relevant for people with a strong belief in a just world, and further, that accurate deception detection is a matter of justice. Based on this reasoning, we expected people with a strong belief in a just world to have an increased motivation to accurately detect deception after mortality salience. Consequently, we hypothesized dispositional differences in belief in a just world to be unrelated to accuracy in deception detection after mortality salience. In line with these predictions, our study revealed that participants with a strong (vs. weak) belief in a just world were worse in deception detection unless they had first been reminded of their mortality.

Trust and online information-sharing in close relationships: a cross-cultural perspective

Culture has an essential influence on online trust building in close relationships. The objective of this study was to investigate the effect of culture on interpersonal trust and online information-sharing in close relationships. A social dilemma game experiment was conducted by inviting close friend dyads from interdependent (that is, Chinese) or independent cultures (that is, German). Their trust and information-sharing performance in either online text chatting or face-to-face communication were examined. The results showed that in close relationships, Chinese participants had higher interpersonal trust and objective-sharing performance than German participants; Chinese trust and self-evaluated performance were not influenced by communication media; in comparison, German participants’ trust and self-evaluated performance significantly dropped online. The results confirmed that interdependent people are more relation-oriented in building their trust than independent people. Implications for online information-sharing management and the interface design were provided.

Association between interpersonal trust, reciprocity, and depression in South Korea: a prospective analysis.

BackgroundA growing body of empirical evidence indicates that low-level social capital is related to poor mental health outcomes. However, the prospective association between social capital and depression remains unclear, and no published studies have investigated the association with longitudinal data in East-Asian countries.MethodsWe analyzed data from the ongoing Korean Welfare Panel Study to prospectively investigate association between social capital and depression. Social capital was measured at the individual level by two items specific to interpersonal trust and reciprocity. Depression was annually assessed as a dichotomous variable using the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale. After excluding participants who had depression in 2006, logistic regression models were applied to estimate the association between each social capital indicator and new-onset depression developed in 2007 or long-term depression in both 2007 and 2008. We also examined the association in a subpopulation restricted to healthy participants after excluding individuals with any pre-existing disability, chronic disease, or poor self-rated health condition.ResultsCompared to the high interpersonal trust group, the odds ratios of developing new-onset and long-term depression among the low interpersonal trust group were 1.22 (95% CI: 1.08∼1.38) and 1.23 (95% CI: 1.03∼1.50), respectively, and increased to 1.32 (95% CI: 1.10∼1.57) and 1.47 (95% CI: 1.05∼2.08) in the subpopulation analyses restricted to healthy individuals. Although the low and intermediate reciprocity group also had significantly higher odds of developing new-onset depression compared to the high reciprocity group, the effects were attenuated and statistically non-significant in the subpopulation analyses.ConclusionLow interpersonal trust appears to be an independent risk factor for new-onset and long-term depression in South Korea.

Relationship of cognitions and symptoms of agoraphobia in Hong Kong Chinese: A combined quantitative and qualitative study

The aim of this study was to explore and describe the subjective experiences of agoraphobia in Hong Kong Chinese. This was a cross-sectional descriptive study, using a combined qualitative-quantitative approach. In the qualitative part, two focus groups were held with nine participants suffering from DSM-IV panic disorder with agoraphobia, followed up in a regional hospital in Hong Kong. The audiotaped was transcribed and analysed into four main categories and 13 subcategories based on a grounded theory approach. One subcategory ('Fear of making others worried and being a burden to others') was identified as a novel, culture-specific concept in agoraphobia that was not reported in Western literature. In the quantitative part, this subcategory was redefined and measured by a two-item, self-rated questionnaire survey in another 35 participants suffering from DSM-IV defined panic disorder with agoraphobia. Qualitative data showed that the clinical manifestations of agoraphobia were specifically related to the underlying corresponding catastrophic cognitions. An individual's agoraphobic cognitions and symptoms were highly related to the identity of the surrounding people during panic attacks in agoraphobic situations, which reflected the characteristic structure of the Chinese interpersonal network. Participants preferred reliance on self to cope with the anxiety first, then turned to their family members for help due to higher interpersonal trust. Participants also expressed fear of affecting others due to their illness. A new sub-theme of agoraphobia ('Fear of making others worried and being a burden to others') was extracted from the qualitative data. Its validity was confirmed by the quantitative description of this new theme using a self-rated questionnaire as a methodological triangulation. The central theme to emerge from the qualitative data was that agoraphobia is a clinical condition that has a close relationship to Chinese cultural factors. 'Fear of making others worried and being a burden to others' is a new concept in agoraphobia worthy of further study.

Security Communities and Their Values: Taking Masses Seriously

This article analyzes political and social values held by people in security communities (regions in which large-scale use of violence is very unlikely). Inhabitants of four security communities (in Europe, North America, South America, and South-East Asia) are generally more tolerant to out-groups than the rest of the world's population. In addition, comprehensive security communities (that is zones where not only interstate war, but also civil war, has become unthinkable) are characterized by higher interpersonal trust. The hypothesized effect of democracy, economic liberalism, and social participation was not confirmed. Going back to Deutsch's conceptualization of the security community, the article challenges assumptions frequent in the constructivist literature.

Where has the trust gone?

For at-risk children and adolescents, having close interpersonal connections with adults at school has been implicated as a powerful protective factor. It is unclear, however, which aspects of these supportive relationships are responsible for the ameliorative effects. The construct of generalized interpersonal trust has been suggested as one potential factor associated with the beneficial effects of supportive relationships. The purpose of the present study was to investigate the relationships between interpersonal trust, connections with adults, and a variety of academic and school climate factors. Results of a MANCOVA analysis indicated significant main effects for level of interpersonal trust and number of adult connections. Post-hoc univariate tests revealed that students with higher interpersonal trust reported significantly more positive perceptions of school climate, personal safety on campus, dangerous activities on campus, hostile attitudes and beliefs, and violence victimization. Students with more adult connections reported significantly more positive perceptions of school climate and regard for school. These findings indicate that school climate issues are critical factors impacting students’ outcomes. As such, considering a strategic plan that focuses on (a) implementing programs to address the developing sense of interpersonal relationships (e.g., respect and trust) between students and all adults and (b) increasing the number of positive student-adult relationships in schools is suggested.