Revisiting the trustworthiness–trust relationship: Exploring the differential predictors of cognition‐ and affect‐based trust

• Date: 01 July 2020
• Published date: 01 July 2020
• Author: Andrew K. Schnackenberg,Edward C. Tomlinson,Steven R. Ash,David Dawley
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/job.2448

RESEARCH ARTICLE

Revisiting the trustworthiness–trust relationship: Exploring the

differential predictors of cognition- and affect-based trust

Edward C. Tomlinson

1

| Andrew K. Schnackenberg

2

| David Dawley

1

|

Steven R. Ash

3

1

Department of Management, West Virginia

University, Morgantown, West Virginia, USA

2

Management Department, University of

Denver, Denver, Colorado, USA

3

Department of Management, University of

Akron, Akron, Ohio, USA

Correspondence

Edward C. Tomlinson, West Virginia

University, Morgantown, WV, USA.

Email: edward.tomlinson@mail.wvu.edu

Funding information

WVU College of Business & Economics

research funding

Summary

We seek to develop a better understanding of interpersonal trust by bridging the gap

between two heretofore distinct paradigms of trust. One paradigm views trust in

terms of two dimensions: cognition- and affect-based. The other paradigm views

trust as being distinct from trustworthiness, which has four dimensions: ability,

behavioral integrity, benevolence, and values congruence. Currently, theoretical con-

sensus is lacking about the antecedents of cognition- and affect-based trust in the

first paradigm that incorporates insights from research on trustworthiness in the sec-

ond paradigm. We show that this lack of consensus is problematic for internal knowl-

edge development and external knowledge expansion. Thus, we join both paradigms

by theorizing that ability and behavioral integrity are the most important predictors

of cognition-based trust, whereas benevolence and values congruence are the most

important predictors of affect-based trust. Across two samples, we found that our

predictions were largely supported. Based on relative weights analysis, ability and

behavioral integrity were more important than values congruence in predicting

cognition-based trust, and benevolence was more important than ability in predicting

affect-based trust. Furthermore, we found evidence that these relationships were

largely robust to changes in the referent of analysis.

KEYWORDS

affect, cognition, relative weights analysis, trust, trustworthiness

1|INTRODUCTION

Research has yielded a variety of insights on the importance of culti-

vating trusting interpersonal relationships in the workplace. Among

these findings, there is robust evidence of a positive relationship

between trust and various work-related attitudes and performance

behaviors (e.g., Colquitt, Scott, & LePine, 2007; Dirks & Ferrin, 2002).

For example, trust in one's supervisor is associated with greater self-

efficacy, psychological safety, job performance (Li & Tan, 2013),

knowledge sharing (Nerstad et al., 2018), and job engagement

(Haynie, Mossholder, & Harris, 2016).

Accordingly, management researchers have devoted considerable

effort to understanding interpersonal trust. Since the mid-1990s, a

substantial body of trust research has fallen into one of two distinct

but nonexclusive paradigms. The first paradigm, which we label as

cognition- and affect-based trust research (C/ABT), distinguishes

between two major dimensions of trust. Trust in another can be char-

acterized as cognition-based trust (CBT; i.e., based on rational calcula-

tion) and affect-based trust (ABT; i.e., based on emotional

attachment). Within this paradigm, researchers have established that

separate dimensions of trust are useful to organizations for different

purposes. For example, CBT mediates the relationship between trans-

formational leadership and task performance, whereas ABT mediates

the relationship between transformational leadership and job satisfac-

tion (Y. Zhu & Akhtar, 2014b). Prior studies have also uncovered a

number of antecedents of each trust dimension. For instance, Dunn,

Received: 1 October 2018 Revised: 27 March 2020 Accepted: 20 April 2020

DOI: 10.1002/job.2448

J Organ Behav. 2020;41:535–550. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/job © 2020 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. 535

Ruedy, and Schweitzer (2012) found that upward social comparisons

in organizations (i.e., comparisons with someone whose performance

is superior to one's own) could harm ABT, whereas downward social

comparisons (i.e., comparisons with someone whose performance is

inferior to one's own) could harm CBT.

The second paradigm, trustworthiness and trust (TW/T) research,

distinguishes between the factors that give rise to interpersonal trust

(i.e., trustworthiness factors) and trust itself. Within this paradigm,

researchers have examined how trustworthiness factors underlie the

cultivation of trust (as a unidimensional construct) across a variety of

organizational contexts and conditions. For example, Mayer and

Gavin (2005) showed that trust in one's manager was based on the

manager's perceived ability, benevolence, and integrity. In the context

of organizational recruitment and selection, Klotz, da Motta Veiga,

Buckley, and Gavin (2013) posited that the trustworthiness of organi-

zational agents (e.g., hiring managers) is vital to facilitate job applicant

trust in the hiring organization. Frazier, Tupper, and Fainshmidt (2016)

found that the route to high trust in one's supervisor differed between

early stage and established relationships: In early stage relationships,

high supervisor ability, benevolence, and integrity were sufficient; but

in established relationships, either high supervisor ability and integrity

or high supervisor ability and benevolence, in conjunction with high

propensity to trust, were sufficient.

Despite substantial research within each paradigm, consensus

knowledge is currently lacking about the antecedents of C/ABT in the

first tradition that integrates insights from research on trustworthi-

ness in the second tradition. This is problematic for two reasons. First,

consensus about conceptual interrelationships within any domain of

study is necessary to enhance researchers' abilities to pursue key

questions that advance core knowledge (Hollenbeck, 2008). For

example, researchers have examined contextual variables (e.g., social

comparisons, reputation, source expertise, leadership styles, etc.;

Dirks & Ferrin, 2002; Dunn et al., 2012; Johnson & Grayson, 2005)

for their impact on C/ABT without offering a robust theoretical

grounding of their causal sequencing or the logic guiding their selec-

tion of specific antecedents. As the proximal antecedents of trust,

trustworthiness factors “are the most important predictors of trust”

(Corbitt, Thanasankit, & Yi, 2003, p. 210) such that contextual ante-

cedents (e.g., reputation or social comparisons) should only predict

trust to the extent that they influence the trustor's perception of the

trustee's trustworthiness. Despite this generally accepted principle in

the trust literature, we know surprisingly little about the conditions of

trustworthiness that give rise to each dimension of trust. Thus, exis-

ting knowledge about the antecedents of trust types is unsystematic

largely due to lack of internal consensus in the trust literature about

the interrelationships among trustworthiness dimensions (as the prox-

imal antecedents of trust) and trust types.

Second, given trust is perhaps one of the most important and

widely applied concepts across domains of research in the organiza-

tional literature, consensus about the interrelationships between

trustworthiness dimensions and trust types have potentially far-

reaching consequences. For example, in psychological contracts

research, C/ABT have been found to underpin transactional and

relational psychological contracts, respectively (Atkinson, 2007). How-

ever, the specific forms of trustworthiness that develop CBT versus

ABT are unknown. In leadership research, transformational leaders

have been shown to build more CBT than ABT, but transformational

leaders who engender ABT are generally more effective

(N. A. Gillespie & Mann, 2004; W. Zhu, Newman, Miao, &

Hooke, 2013; Y. Zhu & Akhtar, 2014a). However, the trustworthiness

dimensions needed for transformational leaders to cultivate more

affect-based (i.e., performance enhancing) trust are unknown.

Although these and other studies have generated a variety of useful

insights, open questions remain that are only possible to advance in a

systematic fashion with greater consensus knowledge about the theo-

retical interrelationships among trustworthiness dimensions and trust

types.

Thus, in this study, we pursue consensus knowledge about the

antecedents of trust types by examining the interrelationships among

trustworthiness dimensions and C/ABT specifically, with implications

for advancing the understanding of related domains where interper-

sonal trust is commonly studied. Before we proceed, we point out

that our efforts here represent an important initial step in consensus

generation, but we in no way wish to preclude subsequent scholarly

debate. Indeed, consensus exists around many ideas in the organiza-

tion sciences that continue to be richly debated as the meaning and

boundary conditions of those ideas are stretched and incorporated

into other scholarly domains. Our pursuit of consensus intends to

highlight the importance of understanding the basic properties and

interrelationships among focal theoretical constructs in trust research.

2|THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

To develop our framework, we begin by considering extant theory

within each paradigm in isolation and then proceed to integrate the

two paradigms of trust research. Specifically, we draw from theory

and empirical research in each paradigm to develop hypotheses of

how these distinct paradigms relate to each other (cf. Caza, Vough, &

Puranik, 2018; Martinko & Thomson, 1998).

2.1 |The dimensions of trust (C/ABT)

McAllister (1995) argues that trust refers to “the extent to which a

person is confident in, and willing to act on the basis of, the words,

actions, and decisions of another”(p. 25). Building on earlier research

(Johnson-George & Swap, 1982; Lewis & Weigert, 1985; Rempel,

Holmes, & Zanna, 1985), McAllister (1995) proposed two fundamen-

tally different dimensions of trust: “cognition-based trust, grounded in

individual beliefs about peer reliability and dependability, and affect-

based trust, grounded in reciprocated interpersonal care and concern”

(p. 25). Chua, Ingram, and Morris (2008) refer to these dimensions as

“trust from the head”and “trust from the heart,”respectively.

McAllister's model has become so widely used that it is now a stan-

dard part of the vernacular in trust research.

536 TOMLINSON ET AL.