Trust (emotion)

Trust is the feeling that someone or something is good, reliable, and capable of meeting expectations. Trust arises when people interact with each other and those interactions yield positive results. When two people come to feel that they can believe in and rely on each other, a sense of trust develops between them. In the event that something negative happens between those people, however, that sense of trust can be quickly broken. This illustrates both that trust is also an attitude that people have toward those they hope will be trustworthy and that trust cannot exist when trustworthiness does not exist. Broadly speaking, trust is an essential part of life. People must be able to form relationships of trust with others to navigate through everyday life. Trust is also important in professional settings. Businesses can only thrive when there is a sufficient level of trust between employers, employees, and coworkers.

Background

Trust has long been a subject of study for experts in psychology. Most early work on the subject was approached from the perspective of trust as a property of individuals, similar to confidence or shyness. This view holds that trust is based on the degree to which one believes that other people can be depended upon to be helpful, cooperative, and reliable. There was subsequently little change in the common theoretical approach to trust until the 1980s. Around that time, many experts began approaching the study of trust from partner-specific and relationship-specific perspectives. Taken from this interpersonal perspective, trust is viewed as a given person's psychological orientation toward a specific partner with whom he or she shares some sort of interdependent relationship. This perspective also holds that the degree to which an individual trusts one person has no definite bearing on how much that individual might trust another person.

The study of trust primarily involves three separate, but related, components: self, the partner involved, and the specific situation at play. In addition, some experts suggest that trust is also based on a key set of beliefs and expectations about the extent to which the actions of a potential partner are likely to support one's long-term interests and goals, especially in situations when one is forced to rely on a partner to provide specific benefits that are crucial to a positive outcome. Such scenarios are referred to as trust-relevant situations. Psychologically, trust-relevant situations are tied to two specific cognitive processes: feelings of vulnerability and one's expectations of how a partner will respond when need arises. In the event that a partner is willing to prioritize an individual's best interests over his or her own, both parties tend to feel an increased sense of trust. The same is true when both parties' interests align or when the individual believes that his or her partner will do whatever is best for the relationship. Conversely, when a partner does not seem willing to prioritize an individual's interest over his or her own or when the parties' interests do not align, the sense of trust between the parties will likely be diminished.

Overview

Trust is generally a difficult concept to define because it refers to a feeling that often defies simple explanation. In short, it is easier to understand psychologically and emotionally than it is to articulate verbally. Nonetheless, many experts have sought to develop a formal explanation of trust. One such expert was Dr. Duane C. Tway, who described a three-pronged model of trust in a landmark 1993 dissertation. Tway argued that trust is a combination of capacity for trusting, perception of competence, and perception of intention. Capacity for trusting refers to one's ability and willingness to risk trusting others based on personal experience. Perception of competence is one's perception of his or her ability and the ability of others to achieve the desired outcome in a particular situation. Perception of intentions, meanwhile, is one's perception that the decisions made and actions taken by both parties in a trustful relationship are driven by mutually serving motives.

Another insightful theory on trust was put forth by business consultant and trust expert Cynthia Olmstead. Olmstead developed the so-called "ABCD" model of trust that outlines the four key qualities of trustworthy people. According to her model, trustworthy people are able, believable, connected, and dependable. In relation to the ABCD model, people who have the requisite skills to complete a given task are considered able, people who are honest and capable of keeping confidences are considered believable, people who work well with others are considered connected, and people who do precisely what they say they will do are considered dependable. According to Olmstead, a person who exhibits all of these qualities is truly trustworthy.

A similar theory was suggested by Utah State University strategic management professor James Davis. According to Davis, trust is driven by ability, benevolence, and integrity. In this theory, ability is the degree to which a person is capable of performing a given task, benevolence is a person's willingness and desire to do good for others, and integrity refers to the core values shared between the people in a trustful relationship.

The most common form of trust is interpersonal trust, or the trust that exists between individuals. Interpersonal trust is a regular part of everyday life and a necessary component of human interaction. Organizational trust is another type of trust that plays a crucial role in the business world. Organizational trust refers to the overall evaluation of a company's trustworthiness as determined by the employee. In most cases, companies with a higher level of organizational trust are more likely to succeed than others. Other forms of trust include government trust and professional trust. Government trust refers to the level of trust that people have in systems of government and the individual leaders who are part of such systems. Professional trust usually relates to certain social situations in which there exists a special trust relationship between an individual and a professional person. Patient/doctor relationships that involve some level of legal confidentiality are one example of professional trust. The relationship shared between a priest and someone who seeks to make a confession is another.

Bibliography

Faulkner, Paul, and Thomas Simpson, editors. The Philosophy of Trust, Oxford UP, 2017.

Hawley, Katherine. Trust: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford UP, 2012.

Heathfield, Susan M. "Trust Rules: The Most Important Secret about Trust." The Balance, 26 Aug. 2016, www.thebalance.com/trust-rules-the-most-important-secret-about-trust-1919393. Accessed 8 Dec. 2017.

Hoff, Naphtali. "The Importance of Building Trust." Huffington Post, 3 Mar. 2017, www.huffingtonpost.com/naphtali-hoff/the-importance-of-buildin‗1‗b‗9366838.html. Accessed 8 Dec. 2017.

Hommel, Bernhard, and Lorenza S. Colzato. "Interpersonal Trust: An Event-Based Account." Frontiers in Psychology, 15 Sept. 2015, www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2015.01399/full. Accessed 8 Dec. 2017.

McLeod, Carolyn. "Trust." Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 3 Aug. 2015, plato.stanford.edu/entries/trust. Accessed 8 Dec. 2017.

Savage, Adrian. "The Importance of Trust." Lifehack, www.lifehack.org/articles/productivity/the-importance-of-trust.html. Accessed 8 Dec. 2017.

Zak, Paul J. "The Neuroscience of Trust." Harvard Business Review, Jan.–Feb. 2017, hbr.org/2017/01/the-neuroscience-of-trust. Accessed 8 Dec. 2017.