The structure of trust as a reflection of culture and institutional power structure: Evidence from four East Asian societies
[1];
[2];
[6];
- School of Psychology Massey University Auckland New Zealand
- School of Psychology Massey University Auckland New Zealand, Faculty of Psychology Beijing Normal University Beijing China
- Marbella International University Centre Marbella Spain
- Department of Psychology Claremont Graduate University Claremont California USA
- Department of Psychology Fu Jen Catholic University New Taipei City Taiwan
- Department of Psychology Philosophy School Wuhan University Wuhan China
- Department of Psychology Sungkyunkwan University Seoul Republic of Korea
- Graduate School of Humanities and Sociology University of Tokyo Bunkyō Japan
- Faculty of Informatics Kansai University Osaka Japan
Using the Global Trust Inventory, an integrated measure of trust toward 21 relationships and institutions, the structure of trust was explored in four East Asian societies (Mainland China, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan). The Western model, in which trust is distributed among seven factors representing different branches of society, did not generalize to these East Asian societies, perhaps due to differences in culture and institutional power structures. Instead, two unique structures of trust were identified. Mainland China had a top‐down structure of trust (the China model), in which trust is hierarchically separated between the central government and subordinate implementing bodies. The other three democratic East Asian societies shared a hybrid structure of trust (the Democratic East Asian model) that has a degree of similarity to both the China model and the Western model. Having established two similar, but still distinct models, a cross‐cultural comparison was made on the proportions of trust profiles generated by latent profile analysis. Mainland China had the largest proportion of people with a high propensity to trust, followed by Japan and South Korea, and Taiwan was the least trusting. Implications of the structure of trust and this alternative approach to conducting cross‐cultural comparisons are discussed.
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE
- OSTI ID:
- 1482270
- Journal Information:
- Asian Journal of Social Psychology, Journal Name: Asian Journal of Social Psychology Vol. 22 Journal Issue: 1; ISSN 1367-2223
- Publisher:
- Wiley-BlackwellCopyright Statement
- Country of Publication:
- Country unknown/Code not available
- Language:
- English
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