Trust in morality versus trust in competence: A comparative analysis

对道德的信任与对能力的信任：比较分析

• 批准号: 432688942
• 负责人: Professor Dr. Detlef Fetchenhauer
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: Institut für Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie (ISS)
• 依托单位国家: 德国
• 项目类别: Research Grants
• 财政年份: 2019
• 资助国家: 德国
• 起止时间: 2018-12-31 至 2021-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gepris.dfg.de/gepris/projekt/432688942?language=en
• 关键词: Trust; morality; versus; trust; competence

Many everyday situations require trust in the competence of our fellow human beings (e.g., visiting the doctor or taking a train ride). Although competence has been identified as an important facet of trustworthiness in many research fields, research in social psychology has so far paid little attention to trust in competence. Therefore, the aim of this research project is a systematic comparison of the properties and causal determinants of trust in morality and of trust in competence. Numerous studies were able to show that trust in the morality of other people does not mainly result from an instrumental, profit-maximizing calculation but is instead primarily guided by moral norms. Out of respect people do not want to signal their distrust to another person, even though at the cognitive level, they judge the morality of their interaction partners to be low and even though in similar non-social decision-making situations (e.g., lotteries), they are unwilling to take equivalent risks. Based on innovative experimental methods, this research project enables a direct comparison of otherwise structurally identical morality- and competence-related trust decisions. For one thing, trust in morality or competence will be measured as specific behavior in economic games – in the trust game known from previous research and in a competence game specially developed for this research project in which it is not the morality but the competence of a trustee that determines the outcome of the interaction. For another thing, cognitive trust (i.e., expectations regarding the trustworthiness of interaction partners) as well as the moral norms and emotions relevant in the context of the trust decision will be assessed in order to allow for a comparative analysis of the basic structures and determinants of trust in morality and competence. A particular focus is on the questions of whether and under what conditions trust in competence has similar characteristics to trust in morality and under what conditions trust in competence is more akin to non-social risk decisions. In this regard, it is argued that the relevance the respective competence dimension has to the self-esteem of the trustee might play a central role. That is, moral norms of respect should only substantially influence trust decisions if the underlying competence dimension is considered to be relevant to the self-esteem of the trustee. In addition, the properties and causal determinants of decisions in which people simultaneously trust in the morality and the competence of another person will be investigated in an explorative way.

许多日常情况需要信任我们人类同伴的能力（例如，看医生或乘火车）。虽然能力在许多研究领域被认为是可信度的一个重要方面，但迄今为止，社会心理学的研究很少关注能力中的信任。因此，本研究项目的目的是对道德信任和能力信任的性质和因果决定因素进行系统比较。大量研究表明，对他人道德的信任主要不是来自工具性的、利润最大化的计算，而是主要受道德规范的指导。出于尊重，人们不想对另一个人表示不信任，即使在认知层面上，他们判断他们的互动伙伴的道德水平很低，即使在类似的非社会决策情境中（例如，彩票），他们也不愿意承担同等的风险。基于创新的实验方法，本研究项目能够对结构相同的道德和能力相关的信任决策进行直接比较。首先，对道德或能力的信任将被衡量为经济博弈中的特定行为——在先前研究中已知的信任博弈和为本研究项目专门开发的能力博弈中，决定互动结果的不是受托人的道德，而是受托人的能力。另一方面，认知信任（即对互动伙伴可信度的期望）以及与信任决策相关的道德规范和情感将被评估，以便对道德和能力信任的基本结构和决定因素进行比较分析。一个特别关注的问题是，对能力的信任是否以及在什么条件下与对道德的信任具有相似的特征，以及在什么条件下对能力的信任更类似于非社会风险决策。在这方面，有人认为各自的能力维度对受托人自尊的相关性可能发挥核心作用。也就是说，尊重的道德规范只有在基本能力维度被认为与受托人的自尊相关的情况下才会实质性地影响信任决策。此外，将以探索性的方式调查人们同时信任另一个人的道德和能力的决定的性质和因果决定因素。