Measuring Generalized Trust: Two New Approaches

Abstract

The Stranger Face Trust (SFT) questionnaire and the Imaginary Stranger Trust (IST) questionnaire are two new self-report measures of generalized trust that assess trust in real (SFT) and imaginary (IST) strangers across four trust domains. Both were designed to be objective, empirically valid, and easy to administer and score. To assess measurement validity and reliability, SFT and IST along with other common measures of social trust, sociodemographic characteristics, biographical characteristics, and a survey experiment were administered to a large representative sample of Qualtrics web-panel members ( N = 2,041). Confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation models established the internal consistency, convergent validity, discriminant validity, and criterion validity of SFT and IST. Further tests revealed that SFT and IST correlate with well-established predictors of generalized trust, while other correlates like the age–trust relation were called into question. Taken together, this article shows that SFT and IST are valid and reliable instruments for the measurement of generalized trust and that common measures of generalized trust appear to be less valid and less reliable. This article ends with a discussion of the implications and directions for future research.

An Empirical Comparison of Four Generalized Trust Scales: Test-Retest Reliability, Measurement Invariance, Predictive Validity, and Replicability

“…Since the instrument's inception, efforts have been made to alter the question's wording, structure, scale length, and dimensionality (Bauer and Freitag 2018;Lundmark et al 2015;Uslaner 2011Uslaner , 2015). Yet the validity and reliability of these measures has come under increasing empirical scrutiny (Delhey et al 2011;Freitag and Bauer 2013;Glanville and Paxton 2007;Miller and Mitamura 2003;Reeskens and Hooghe 2008;Robbins 2019;Sturgis and Smith 2010;Torpe and Lolle 2011;van Hoorn 2014), which raises doubts about the associations and trends observed in the literature as well as the scientific community's ability to make comparisons across studies, countries, and time. If unrectified, the continued use of these measures will undoubtedly hinder scientific progress and the accumulation of knowledge.…”

“…With these newly proposed scales, Robbins (2019) assessed their face validity and content validity, and performed various measurement validation tests. With respect to the former, Robbins (2019) claims-like many others (Bauer and Freitag 2018;Colquitt et al 2007;Erikson 1950;Robbins 2016b;Rotter 1967)-that the concept of generalized trust "… is best thought of as a baseline starting point at which people (dis)trust strangers for any number of matters (p. 7)."…”

“…As he points out, specific strangers and particular maters for which trust is placed are not operationalized in common measures of generalized trust, indicating their low face validity and content validity. With SFT and IST, Robbins (2019) treats "…generalized trust as a latent construct in which observed indicators of generalized trust manifest as assessments of trustworthiness for particular matters (in the case of SFT and IST) regarding specific strangers (in the case of SFT) (p. 8)."…”

“…He contends, as a result, that SFT and IST have greater face validity and content validity than common measures of generalized trust. Regarding measurement validation, Robbins (2019) uses confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation models to establish the factorial validity, internal consistency, convergent validity, discriminant validity, concurrent validity, and known-groups validity of SFT and IST. He also reveals that common generalized trust scales-the Misanthropy scale (MST) and Generalized Social Trust scale (GST)-appear to be less valid and less reliable than SFT and IST.…”

“…Third, the criterion validity of common generalized trust measures is well known (Bauer et al 2019;Paxton and Glanville 2015;Robbins 2016aRobbins , 2019, especially their ability to predict behavior in economic games (Fehr et al 2002;Gachter et al 2004;Lo Iacono 2018;Peysakhovich et al 2014;Sapienza et al 2013). Although Robbins (2019) reveals that SFT and IST exhibit strong concurrent validity, the extent to which SFT/IST predicts cooperation remains unknown. Predictive validity is one of the most powerful tools for establishing a measure's overall validity.…”