Complexity of two-way trust in a dynamic system

Trust thought for today - people are complicated!

Reflecting on my previous post on the debunking of nudge theory (a record for me of 26+k views, 258 likes, 80+ comments & 26 re-shares! https://bit.ly/39IPbzP) and my own influence by the ubiquity of behavioural science as the answer to all questions. Someone I worked with early on in my trust research felt that BS would give us 'the answer' to causes of distrust and earning trust. So I re-read the usual books, and loads of papers from psychology of trust, sociology, anthropology & more. It soon became clear that it was SO much more complicated but also that heuristics and biases were in the mix in complex ways.

Trust is a two way thing - how a person/organisation sees me/the world influences their behaviour towards me, which in turn influences mine back. But the lens we all look on the world looks very different for lots of reasons, including the assumptions about humans and systems embedded in nudge theory.

It was confusing, so I put it at the back because I didn't know what to do with it!

In a large nutshell, I propose that people make trust judgements (in a quick system 1 way and in a more considered system 2 way) influenced by SO many things:

- Our genetics, body chemistry (oxytocin?), hormones, pre-dispositions, heuristics & biases, personality types

- Our upbringing (socialisation, warmth etc perceptions of others, eg cults have a very narrow view of those whose opinion can be trusted, where multicultural upbringings may broaden our curiosity and tolerance of different perspectives)

- Our experiences (what happen last time, general experiences and interactions with the world and if your trust has been well placed, or if you have been systematically discriminated against, you will trust different people, organisations or systems than those who have not)

- Our world view and view of people in general and specifically, our identity, politics, friends and influencers and our personal reflection and view and assumptions on what this particular trust decision says about us

- The context, the system we operate in, the culture and norms of where we live, what's happening in the world, what's top of the news

- The inherent assumptions and beliefs we have based on all the above

- Our feelings on the personal benefits and risks of the decision based on our view of the trustworthiness of the organisation, system, process, person we are considering whether or not to trust.

This is in a way a systems thinking starting point, but I still don't know what to do with it all! But perhaps we start with working collaboratively with people and finding what works for them bottom up, rather than this top down paternalistic approach, with or without BS.

Trust people more as a starting point, and not consider them as specimens in a lab to be poked to see what happens.

For more see https://www.tigtech.org

If you got this far, love any thoughts!