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Trust and trustworthiness of immigrants and native-born Americans

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  • Cox, James C.
  • Orman, Wafa Hakim

Abstract

Trust and trustworthiness are crucial to amelioration of social dilemmas. Distrust and malevolence aggravate social dilemmas. We use an experimental moonlighting game with a sample of the U.S. population, oversampling immigrants, to observe interactions between immigrants and native-born Americans in a social dilemma situation that can elicit both benevolent and malevolent actions. We survey participants in order to relate outcomes in the moonlighting game to demographic characteristics and traditional, survey-based measures of trust and trustworthiness and show that they are strongly correlated. Overall, we find that immigrants are as trusting as native-born U.S. citizens when they interact with native-born citizens but do not trust other immigrants. Immigrants appear to be less trustworthy overall but this finding disappears when we control for demographic variables. Women and older people are less likely to trust but no more or less trustworthy. Highly religious immigrants are less trusting and less trustworthy than both other immigrants and native-born Americans.

Suggested Citation

  • Cox, James C. & Orman, Wafa Hakim, 2015. "Trust and trustworthiness of immigrants and native-born Americans," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 1-8.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:soceco:v:57:y:2015:i:c:p:1-8
    DOI: 10.1016/j.socec.2015.03.008
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Sabina Albrecht & David Smerdon, 2022. "The social capital effects of refugee resettlement on host communities," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 98(320), pages 80-112, March.
    2. Gylfason, Haukur Freyr & Olafsdottir, Katrin, 2017. "Does Gneezy's cheap talk game measure trust?," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 67(C), pages 143-148.
    3. Diego Aycinena & Francisco B. Galarza Arellano & Javier Torres, 2024. "Interactions in a High Immigration Context," Working Papers 199, Peruvian Economic Association.
    4. Felfe, Christina & Kocher, Martin G. & Rainer, Helmut & Saurer, Judith & Siedler, Thomas, 2021. "More opportunity, more cooperation? The behavioral effects of birthright citizenship on immigrant youth," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 200(C).
    5. Nestor Gandelman & Diego Lamé, 2021. "Trust towards migrants," Documentos de Investigación 128, Universidad ORT Uruguay. Facultad de Administración y Ciencias Sociales.
    6. Drouvelis, Michalis & Malaeb, Bilal & Vlassopoulos, Michael & Wahba, Jackline, 2021. "Cooperation in a fragmented society: Experimental evidence on Syrian refugees and natives in Lebanon," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 187(C), pages 176-191.
    7. Néstor Gandelman & Diego Lamé, 2024. "Trust towards migrants," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 96(2), pages 311-331, March.

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