Power dynamics and the reciprocation of trust and distrust

Because trust is essential in relationships, scholars have sought to determine what causes people to trust each other. A burgeoning area of research on trust has focused on power dynamics. Yet, although successful trust development in relationships is a function of one individual initiating trust and another individual reciprocating this trust, research has focused exclusively on the impact of power on trust initiation and left unaddressed the impact of power on trust reciprocation. In the current research, I examine the impact of power dynamics on trust reciprocation-people trusting someone who first trusts them. Across five preregistered experiments, I demonstrate that people are more likely to trust high-power individuals than low-power individuals when these individuals first trust them. I also demonstrate that people are more likely to distrust high-power individuals than low-power individuals when these individuals first distrust them. Power dynamics amplify trust and distrust reciprocation because people believe that having power means making decisions based on dispositions rather than the situation. This belief makes people think that-compared to low-power individuals-high-power individuals view them as more trustworthy when trusting them, but more untrustworthy when distrusting them, which motivates reciprocation. Taken together, these findings show that power helps and hurts trust development and highlight when and why this occurs. This provides some clarity to a literature dominated by inconclusive findings on the relationship between power and trust, provides a blueprint for understanding the impact of power on longer term reciprocal trust development, and provides important practical implications for power holders. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).