Why We Tend to Trust Those Who Were Raised with Less

According to a study published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, people are more inclined to trust those who grew up with limited financial means than those who attended private schools or took European vacations.

“Trust is a cornerstone of healthy relationships—without it, romantic bonds can break down, workplace dynamics can suffer, and social divides can widen,” said lead researcher Kristin Laurin, Ph.D., a psychology professor at the University of British Columbia. “But what actually makes someone seem trustworthy?“

To explore this question, Laurin and her team conducted a series of experiments involving over 1,900 participants, examining whether a person’s social class—either from childhood or their current status—influences how trustworthy they are perceived to be by strangers.

Deception in Group Dynamics

In one experiment, participants played a trust game with what they believed were real people, but were in fact fictional profiles. After creating their own profiles, participants received fake profiles representing members of their “group.”

Some profiles portrayed individuals from lower-income backgrounds, mentioning experiences like attending public schools or holding part-time jobs. Others reflected more affluent upbringings, such as attending private schools or vacationing in Europe.

In the trust game, each participant (“truster“) began with 10 raffle tickets for a prize draw for two $100 gift cards. They could transfer any number of tickets to a fictional group member (“trustee“). Tickets sent to the trustee were tripled, and the trustee could then choose to return any portion of those tickets to the trustee.

The researchers examined trust in two key ways: as a behavior—how much participants were willing to risk—and as an expectation—how much they believed the other person would reciprocate. The number of raffle tickets a participant gave to another player reflected their behavioral trust. To assess expectations, participants were asked to imagine giving all 10 tickets to someone, who would then have 30 after tripling, and estimate how many tickets that person would return.

How Perceptions of Wealth Shape Expectations and Behavior

In additional versions of the experiment, researchers modified the fictional profiles to reflect the trustees’ current socioeconomic status and also asked participants to judge their morality. The findings revealed a consistent pattern: participants tended to behave more trustingly toward individuals from lower-income backgrounds, whether that background was in the past or present. However, they only believed someone was more likely to reciprocate—demonstrating expectation-based trust—if that person had grown up with fewer financial resources.

“People make a clear distinction between someone’s upbringing and their present situation,” said Laurin. “They were more likely to see those raised in low-income households as moral and trustworthy. Interestingly, although participants sometimes acted as if they trusted people currently in lower-income positions, they didn’t necessarily expect those individuals to follow through.”

The results imply that social context matters when presenting oneself in trust-based interactions. “If you’ve always been wealthy, it may help to highlight present circumstances instead,” Laurin said. “But if you’ve struggled financially since childhood, emphasizing that history could work in your favor.”

Importantly, Laurin noted that the study focused on perceptions, not actual behavior. “We didn’t test whether people from different class backgrounds are more or less trustworthy in reality,” she said. “That’s something future research should explore, especially to better understand when trust is or isn’t warranted.”

Read the original article on: Phys Org

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