No abstract

Although trust plays a pivotal role in many aspects of life, very little is known about the manifestation of trust and distrust in everyday life. In this work, we integrated several prior approaches to trust and investigated the prevalence and key determinants of trust (vs. distrust) in people's natural environments, using preregistered experience-sampling methodology. Across more than 4,500 social interactions from a heterogeneous sample of 427 participants, results showed high average levels of trust, but also considerable variability in trust across contexts. This variability was attributable to aspects of trustee perception, social distance, as well as three key dimensions of situational interdependence: conflict of interests, information (un)certainty, and power imbalance. At the dispositional level, average everyday trust was shaped by general trust, moral identity, and zero-sum beliefs. The social scope of most trust-related traits, however, was moderated by social distance: Whereas moral identity buffered against distrusting distant targets, high general distrust and low social value orientation amplified trust differences between close vs. distant others. Furthermore, a laboratory-based trust game predicted everyday trust only with regard to more distant but not close interaction partners. Finally, everyday trust was linked to self-disclosure and to cooperation, particularly in situations of high conflict between interaction partners' interests. We conclude that trust can be conceptualized as a relational hub that interconnects the social perception of the trustee, the relational closeness between trustor and trustee, key structural features of situational interdependence, and behavioral response options such as self-disclosure.

People do not trust hypocrites, because they preach water, but drink wine. The current research shows that, ironically, when we distrust, we become moral hypocrites ourselves. We argue that experiencing distrust alerts us to the possibility that others may intent to exploit us, and that such looming exploitation differentially affects moral standards for the self versus others. Four studies ( N = 1,225) examined this possibility and its underlying motivational dynamic. Study 1 established a relationship between dispositional distrust and flexible, self-serving moral cognition. In Studies 2 and 3, participants experiencing distrust (vs. trust) endorsed more lenient moral standards for themselves than for others. Study 4 explored the role of the motivation to avoid exploitation in these effects. Specifically, participants' dispositional victim sensitivity moderated the effect of distrust on hypocrisy. Together, these findings suggest that individuals who distrust and fear to be exploited show self-serving, and hence untrustworthy, moral cognition themselves.

Distrusting your moral compass: The impact of distrust mindsets on moral dilemma processing and judgments.

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