Is the effect of trust on risk perceptions a matter of knowledge, control, and time?
An extension and direct-replication attempt of Siegrist and Cvetkovich (2000)
Publication date
2024-07-30
Document type
Forschungsartikel
Author
Rutjens, Bastiaan T.
Brick, Cameron
Lob, Aaron B.
Buttlar, Benjamin
Noordewier, Marret K.
Schneider, Iris K.
Harreveld, Frenk van
Organisational unit
Publisher
Sage
Series or journal
Social Psychological and Personality Science
ISSN
Periodical volume
15
Periodical issue
8
First page
1008
Last page
1023
Peer-reviewed
✅
Part of the university bibliography
✅
Language
English
Abstract
The complexity of societal risks such as pandemics, artificial intelligence, and climate change may lead laypeople to rely on experts and authorities when evaluating these threats. While Siegrist and Cvetkovich showed that competence-based trust in authorities correlates with perceived societal risks and benefits only when people feel unknowledgeable, recent research has yielded mixed support for this foundational work. To address this discrepancy, we conducted a direct-replication study (preregistered; 1,070 participants, 33 risks, 35,310 observations). The results contradict the original findings. However, additional non-preregistered analyses indicate an alternative perspective aligning with compensatory control theory and the description-experience framework: experiences with insufficient personal control over a threat may amplify individuals’ dependency on powerful others for risk mitigation. These findings highlight the need to reevaluate how trust shapes risk perceptions. Recent societal and technological shifts might have heightened the desire for control compared to subjective knowledge in why people resort to trust.
Description
This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
Version
Published version
Access right on openHSU
Metadata only access