Despite decades of research into trust measuring individual trust remains unsatisfying due to problematic survey questions that are used to measure social trust. There are two main methods used to measure trust, surveys and behavior observation. Surveys ask for people’s judgments about trust, while behavior observation looks at behaviors based on trust. The trust game is an example of the latter, where trust is measured by the amount of money sent from the trustor to the trustee and how both parties behave.
Trust reports by major consultancies and non-alignment
He suggests that non-alignment between the many surveys by organizations like Edelman, Pew Research Center, and major consultancies like Deloitte, PwC, EY and KPMG may be due to different survey questions, different time points for data collection, and different samples. The OECD Guidelines on measuring trust are helpful but could be updated with more recent knowledge. He believes that even though trust is emotional and subjective, it should still be quantified, and mentions his research on audio responses to measure trust. He also points out that definitions of trust are often detached from measurements of trust and discusses his work on finding a better fit between the definition and measurement of trust.
(…) we simply learned over time that the questions we use are to some extent problematic. So, for instance, the most popular survey question that we use to measure social trust goes along the lines: “Do you think that most people can be trusted or that you can’t be careful enough in dealing with people?” And this question contains concepts such as most people, And by now we know that people might interpret this question differently. This is a measurement problem, and we find such measurement problems across different trust survey questions.
Behavioral Trust
(…) So, for instance, I could do an interview with you because I trust you, and in sociology and political science, the most common method to measure trust is to ask people for their judgments in surveys. So we could ask them: “Do you trust your family? Do you trust your neighbours?” and the infamous generalized social trust question that I just mentioned is, for instance, “do you think that most people can be trusted or that you can’t be too careful in dealing with people?”. That’s one way, basically directly asking for these judgments. And besides that, we can also observe the behaviour and then conclude that certain behaviours we observe should be based on a high level of trust. So, for instance, I could observe a friend lending money to another person, and then I would assume that she trusts this other person because I’ve observed this behaviour and there’s actually a large literature that attempts to measure what trust researchers call “behaviourally exhibited trust”, in other words, behaviour that is based on trust.
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For the most part, literature claim trust has inevitably beneficial consequences, whether it’s for society, for the economy, for building community, or for building political alliances and bonds. Pippa Norris, a comparative political scientist who has taught at Harvard for three decades, advocates in her new book the need to rethink our explanations of the evidence for making informed and accurate, and reliable judgments about trustworthy relationships. She sets out the arguments and investigates a series of causes in the theory about what causes skeptical trust and then talks about how we can actually strengthen trust or skeptical trust, which she argues, is the most important aspect. (…)
“In Praise of Skepticism, Trust but Verify” by Pippa Norris, Oxford University Press, New York, N.Y. 2022, ISBN 9780197530115 (paperback), 82 ISBN 9780197530139 (epub), DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780197530108.001.0001
Earlier research by Pippa Norris on trust
Most of Pippa Norris’earlier research work focuses on the relationship between trust and democracy, and how trust in institutions shapes political behavior. One of her main theories is the “trust deficit” theory, which argues that trust in political institutions is declining in many developed democracies. Norris argues that this decline in trust is linked to a range of factors, including economic inequality, political polarization, and the erosion of traditional social bonds. In her book “Democratic Deficit: Critical Citizens Revisited,” she writes “Trust in political institutions is in decline in many developed democracies, and this is linked to a range of factors, including economic inequality, political polarization, and the erosion of traditional social bonds.”
Another theory developed by Norris is the “reciprocal trust” theory, which argues that trust in political institutions is shaped by the actions of those institutions. Norris argues that political institutions that are responsive to citizens’ needs and that provide public goods are more likely to be trusted. In “Democratic Deficit: Critical Citizens Revisited” she also writes “Trust in political institutions is shaped by the actions of those institutions. Political institutions that are responsive to citizens’ needs and that provide public goods are more likely to be trusted.”
Norris conducts her trust research primarily through survey data and quantitative methods. She uses large-scale cross-national surveys such as the World Values Survey,European Values Survey, and Latinobarometro to study trust and political behavior across countries. She also uses experimental methods to study the causal effects of trust on political behavior.
Other publications by Pippa Norris:
Democratic Deficit: Critical Citizens Revisited
Digital Divide? Civic Engagement, Information Poverty, and the Internet Worldwide
A Virtuous Circle: Political Communications in Postindustrial Societies
Digital Divide? Civic Engagement, Information Poverty, and the Internet Worldwide
Radical Right: Voters and Parties in the Electoral Market
Digital Citizen, Digital Voter: The Internet’s Impact on Dem
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