Market mindset hinders interpersonal trust: The exposure to market relationships makes people trust less through elevated proportional thinking and reduced state empathy

Abstract

In a series of five experiments, we provided evidence that evoking the market mindset negatively affects trust. We found that the market mindset reduces trust compared to the communal mindset (Experiment 1) and a neutral condition (Experiment 2). Next, we examined the psychological mechanisms behind the detrimental effect of the market mindset on trust and found that this effect was mediated by enhanced proportional thinking (Experiments 3 and 4) and reduced state empathy (Experiments 4 and 5). Finally, in a preregistered Experiment 5, we showed that these two psychological mechanisms are relatively independent.

Market mindset can increase allocations in the trust game through proportional thinking.

“…Previous research has documented that adopting the market mindset can negatively affect interpersonal trust (Kuzminska, Gasiorowska, & Zaleskiewicz, 2023; Xin & Xin, 2017). In contrast to those earlier results, in this project, we aimed to show that they are not necessarily universal, as the nature of the effect of the market mindset may depend on the characteristics of the situation that calls for trust.…”

“…Having this in mind, we decided to perform Experiment 2 using a wide online study sample to ensure that participants were indeed anonymous to each other. Last, we opted to employ a different method for manipulating the market mindset, which has been successfully used in previous research (e.g., Kuzminska, Gasiorowska, & Zaleskiewicz, 2023; Zaleskiewicz et al, 2020).…”

“…Prior research showing the negative impact of the market mindset on trust relied on attitudinal measures of trust (Kuzminska, Gasiorowska, & Zaleskiewicz, 2023; Xin & Xin, 2017). Importantly, however, some researchers documented a relatively low cohesion between people’s trust declarations and their trusting behavior (e.g., Alós-Ferrer & Farolfi, 2019; Glaeser et al, 2000; Robbins, 2019), suggesting that these two types of measurements might tap related but nonetheless distinct constructs.…”

“…Johnson et al, 2002). In contrast, attitudinal trust measures provide no contextual boundaries and have been shown to bring forth associations with a communal-sharing context (Kuzminska, Gasiorowska, & Zaleskiewicz, 2023), the rules of which are dramatically different from those typical for market-pricing mode (Fiske, 1992). Communal-sharing relationships are closely linked to emotions—they are voluntary and asymmetric, meaning that people offer benefits not because they expect anything in return and of a comparable value, but because they intend to increase the recipient’s welfare or happiness (Clark & Mills, 1993, 2012; Fiske, 1992).…”

The market mindset erodes social mindfulness

“…For instance, certain studies revealed that exposing individuals to market relations or reminding them of their shopping experiences facilitated their proportional thinking, competitiveness, and self-interest (Bauer et al, 2012;Zaleskiewicz et al, 2020). In other words, individuals' participation in the market typically results in the acquisition of a self-interested and rational market mindset (Olga Kuzminska et al, 2022), which may ultimately influence their prosocial behaviours. Social mindfulness is a common prosocial behaviour in daily life that stands apart from other prosocial behaviours due to its low-cost nature.…”