The Social Construction of Trust
In the preceding chapters, we have approached the phenomenon of trust from the trustor’s perspective, relating it to individual adaptive rationality, interpretation, and choice. In other words, we have restricted ourselves to an analysis of trust as resid
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the preceding chapters, we have approached the phenomenon of trust from the trustor’s perspective, relating it to individual adaptive rationality, interpretation, and choice. In other words, we have restricted ourselves to an analysis of trust as residing in the psychological state of the trustor who “passively” responds to the environment and seeks a solution to the trust problem. Importantly, the immediate situation and its context define the relevance of trust-related knowledge. By providing the situational objects and cues that govern the processing mode and trigger the activation of associated frames and scripts, they serve as a basis for interpretation and choice and the context dependent adjustment of rationality. In this chapter, we will take a look at how the trust relation, as a social system, is “actively” constituted by the actors involved. Far from being a passive achievement, interpretation and the subjective definition of the situation are normally reached in symbolic interaction with others, and rely on a dynamic process of communication. At the same time, communication is at the root of the constitution of social systems. Any social system can be reconstructed as a genetic sequence of meaningful communications, in which the actors’ subjective definitions of the situation temporarily converge into a shared social definition of the situation. This process of social framing reflexively structures the situation, and also the context. Actors use a socially shared stock of knowledge to interpret situations, and in doing so, they externalize meaningful symbols that confirm its appropriateness. Therefore, social structure continuously reproduces itself in a reflexive process of structuration and “agency.” Concerning trust, this suggests that (1) trustor and trustee actively constitute the social system of a trust relation in a process of social framing, and (2) the context of the trust relation is not static, but highly dynamic and shaped by the actors involved. Furthermore, the media which actors use to communicate (language, writing, generalized media of exchange, etc.) differ with respect to their abilities to transmit meaning and their capabilities to reduce ambiguity or overcome situational constraints. Many trust researchers argue that face-to-face communication is the most effective means of socially framing a trust problem, because it provides a very rich set of cues which trustors can make use of. On the contrary, “lean” media restrict information and are not conducive to a build-up of trust, because they convey fewer cues, increase anonymity, and open up the potential of defection. Apart from verbal and nonverbal communication, the tangible ac-
S. A. Rompf, Trust and Rationality, Forschung und Entwicklung in der Analytischen Soziologie, DOI 10.1007/978-3-658-07327-5_5, © Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden 2015
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The Social Construction of Trust
tions involved—the choice of a trusting act and its (un)trustworthy response— can become a significant symbol for facilitating social framing as well. All
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