Trustful societies, trustful individuals, and health: An analysis of self-rated health and social trust using the World Value Survey

Jen, Min‐Hua; Sund, Erik R.; Johnston, Ron; Jones, Kelvyn

doi:10.1016/j.healthplace.2010.06.008

Cited by 115 publications

(64 citation statements)

References 39 publications

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“…In spite of heated debate, most academic critics do not reject Wilkinson and Pickett's underlying hypothesis that social position can influence health status, separate from purchasing power. Indeed, one of their critics presents supporting evidence of a link between social trust and health [28] using, as this paper does, decile-level data from the World Values Survey. The history of the relative income hypothesis in the health literature encourages us to examine links between income distribution and environmental impacts using a variety of approaches.…”

Section: Open Accessmentioning

confidence: 67%

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Inequality and Trust: Testing a Mediating Relationship for Environmental Sustainability

Kemp-Benedict

2013

Sustainability

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Instrumental arguments linking inequality to environmental sustainability often suppose a negative relationship between inequality and social cohesion. While social cohesion is difficult to measure, there are measures of a narrower concept, social trust, and empirical studies have shown that social trust is negatively related to inequality. In this paper we test whether at least part of the observed relationship may be explained by income level, rather than income distribution. We use individual response data from the World Values Survey at the income decile level, and find evidence that income level is indeed important in explaining differences in levels of social trust, but it is insufficient to explain all of the dependence. In the sample used for the study, we find that both income level and income distribution help explain differences in social trust between countries.

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Section: Open Accessmentioning

confidence: 67%

“…(They can also choose not to answer the question.) The analysis in this paper uses individual response data, as Jen et al [28] do in their study of social trust and self-reported health. The individual response data in the World Values Survey reports an income range for respondents.…”

Section: Modelmentioning

confidence: 99%

Inequality and Trust: Testing a Mediating Relationship for Environmental Sustainability

Kemp-Benedict

2013

Sustainability

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“…Altogether, what is learned from the weak associations in this study, is the importance of carefully selecting the level of the contexts for research (see Giordano et al 2011;Oksanen et al 2010;Suzuki et al 2010). Hopefully, in the future, a rich selection of indicators will be available that indicate both macro-level (state or country), meso-level (region, society), and individual-level opportunities for cultural participation and experiences (e.g., Harpham et al 2002;Jen et al 2010). These indicators should be based on shared understanding of what is meant by artistic and cultural participation (see Davies et al 2012).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 97%

“…As the dimension of social capital, this research concentrated on trust -more specifically on institutional trust, which means a person's confidence in the trustworthiness of the important governmental and political institutions in his or her own country or internationally (see Harteveld et al 2013;Rothstein and Stolle 2003). Associations between trust and subjective health have been observed in many studies (Campos-Matos et al 2015;Helliwell and Putnam 2004;d'Hombres et al 2010;Jen 2010;Kim et al 2011;Snelgrove et al 2009), but there are also exceptions (Poortinga 2006b;Veenstra 2005). In research, trust has typically been measured as (generalized or interpersonal) trust or reliance on others (see Putnam 2000) and more seldom as institutional trust (Ahlquist et al 2008).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Country-Level Investment in Cultural Opportunity Structures. A Potential Source of Health Differences Between 21 European Countries

Koivusilta

2017

Soc Indic Res

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Individual's participation in cultural activities may positively affect health through a pathway mediated by social capital. We examine whether country-level investment in cultural opportunity structures was associated with between-country differences in self-rated health and, if so, whether these associations were mediated by citizens' confidence in societal institutions, i.e., by institutional trust, regarded as a dimension of social capital. For 24,887 respondents in the European Social Survey, 2006, data on self-rated health, institutional trust (individual-level and country-level), and sociodemographic variables were linked with statistics-based country-level data on 10 indicators of cultural opportunity structures and mediator variables (gross domestic product (GDP), Gini index, and welfare state regime). Over and above the sociodemographics, six cultural indicators contributed to between-country health differences in logistic multilevel regression analysis: the percentage of arts students, the RC index, the percentage of writers and creative artists of total employment, exports of cultural goods, imports of cultural goods, and the number of feature films produced per capita. Controlling, furthermore, for trust, and country-level mediators, only imports of cultural goods contributed to between-country differences in health. No associations with other cultural indicators remained after controlling for GDP or welfare state regime. Institutional trust may partially mediate the significance of cultural investments for self-rated health. However, both cultural investment and trust may be concomitants of general prosperity and welfare policies. Future studies should investigate whether the countries' welfare policies influence the transformation of cultural investment into institutional trust and which types of indicators best depict associations between investments and health.

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“…High levels of social trust are associated with better individual health (e.g., Jen et al 2010). At the individual level, trust may create a social context or environment that is more peaceful and less stressful (Takahashi et al 2005).…”

Section: The Income Inequality Hypothesismentioning

confidence: 99%

The Income Inequality Hypothesis Revisited: Assessing the Hypothesis Using Four Methodological Approaches

Kragten

Rözer

2016

Soc Indic Res

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The income inequality hypothesis states that income inequality has a negative effect on individual's health, partially because it reduces social trust. This article aims to critically assess the income inequality hypothesis by comparing several analytical strategies, namely OLS regression, multilevel regression, fixed effects models and fixed effects models using pseudo panel data. To test the hypothesis, data from two studies conducted between 1981 and 2014 were combined: the World Values Survey and the European Values Study. Three frequently used measures of health were taken into account. In the OLS and multilevel models, income inequality was often associated with better health, whereas in the fixed effects and pseudo panel data, income inequality was associated with poorer health, suggesting that the unexpected results of the OLS and multilevel methods might be explained by unobserved confounders. Furthermore, in almost all of the models, social trust mediates the relationship between income inequality and health, showing the importance of this mechanism. Interestingly, the pseudo panel data offer the strongest support for the income inequality hypothesis, suggesting that better controlling for confounding factors and/or more carefully monitoring cohort effects, may result in a better understanding whether and how income inequality can be harmful for people's health.

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Trustful societies, trustful individuals, and health: An analysis of self-rated health and social trust using the World Value Survey

Cited by 115 publications

References 39 publications

Inequality and Trust: Testing a Mediating Relationship for Environmental Sustainability

Inequality and Trust: Testing a Mediating Relationship for Environmental Sustainability

Country-Level Investment in Cultural Opportunity Structures. A Potential Source of Health Differences Between 21 European Countries

The Income Inequality Hypothesis Revisited: Assessing the Hypothesis Using Four Methodological Approaches

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