Attachment to God and Social Trust

Abstract

Research suggests that religious participation is associated with feelings of social trust. A separate line of work shows that individuals who develop secure, intimate relationships with parents, caregivers, and others have higher levels of trust than those who do not. The current study integrates these two strands of theory and research by examining (1) whether attachment to God has a unique association with social trust, (2) whether different attachment “styles” (i.e., avoidant, anxious) produce variations in trust outcomes, and (3) whether the findings are significant net of controls for sociodemographic characteristics, religious service attendance, prayer, denominational affiliation, and images of God. Analyses are conducted using data from the 2010 Baylor Religion Survey (BRS), a nationwide sample of U.S. adults. Findings suggest that both avoidant and anxious attachment to God are inversely related to overall trust, generalized trust (unknown people and strangers), and particularized trust (neighbors and coworkers). These two measures also interact with education (but not marital status, race, or income) to predict trust in the following way: Both avoidant and anxious attachment to God have stronger inverse associations with trust among individuals with lower levels of education compared with their more highly educated counterparts. Overall, attachment to God may offer an explanation for trust not captured by more widely used indicators of religious life.

Attachment in the time of COVID-19: Insecure attachment orientations are associated with defiance of authorities’ guidelines during the pandemic

“…In contrast with our predictions, however, welfare state trust did not mediate the association between avoidance and adherence to the COVID guidelines, but generalized social trust did (at least marginally). Because highly avoidant people generally have more negative models of others (Mikulincer & Shaver, 2016), and consequently are less trusting (Bradshaw et al, 2019; Fitzpatrick & Lafontaine, 2017; Gruneau Brulin et al), this distrust might make them less convinced that others are adhering to the guidelines and thus might make them less inclined to act in accordance with the guidelines themselves. It should be noted, however, that the effects of both attachment-related avoidance and social trust were rather small, and the mediation model could not be fully confirmed because the confidence intervals included zero.…”

“…Regarding specifically trust, (Bradshaw et al, 2019) found that individuals with higher attachment security to God expressed higher trust in people in general and in specific relationships, and (Gillath et al, 2020) found that trust in artificial intelligence was negatively related to attachment anxiety. In a previous study, we also found that attachment-related avoidance (but not attachment anxiety) was associated with lower levels of generalized social trust and with trust in political institutions (i.e., trust in welfare state institutions, (Gruneau Brulin et al).…”

Education and Social Trust in Global Perspective

“…It can be categorized into different forms depending on the target and/or contexts such as trust in people, trust in political institutions, and trust in organizational settings (for detailed discussions on various forms of trust, see, for example, Uslaner 2002;Yamagishi 2013). Aligning with the dominant conceptualization of trust in sociological research (e.g., Bradshaw et al 2019;Lewis and Weigert 2012;Luhmann 1979;Sztompka 1999), in this study, I focus on generalized social trust, an abstract form of trust with people in general as the target and society at large as the context. 1 Trust in "a wider circle of unfamiliar others" (Delhey, Newton, and Welzel 2011:786) reflects people's "favorable expectation" of others (Möllering 2001:404).…”

Ethical Implication of God Concept in Javanese Prayers

“…Partisipasi agama dikaitkan dengan perasaan kepercayaan sosial. Individu yang mengembangkan hubungan yang aman dan intim dengan orang tua, pengasuh, dan lain-lain memiliki tingkat kepercayaan yang lebih tinggi daripada mereka yang tidak melakukannya (Bradshaw et al, 2019). Doa Bersama dalam komunitas menetapkan dan memperdalam rasa kebersamaan sedemikian rupa sehingga mendukung tercapainya tujuan umum secara lebih efektif (Cockayne & Salter, 2019).…”

“…Slametan biasanya berhubungan dengan fakta kohesivitas sosial antar anggota kelompok secara kuat. Hal ini sesuai dengan temuan penelitian yang menjelaskan bahwa hubungan yang intim dengan keluarga atau orang yang dianggap melindungi akan meningkatkan kepercayaan diri (Bradshaw et al, 2019). Doa bersama seperti halnya yang dilakukan pada acara slametan menguatkan dan meningkatkan rasa kebersamaan yang secara teoritik mendukung tercapainya tujuan umum secara lebih efektif (Cockayne &Salter, 2019).…”