To Trust or Not to Trust? An Experimental Assessment of Followers’ Decisions to Trust Leaders

Follower trust is an essential component of effective leadership. Indeed, followers are not just passive observers, but active and often overlooked components of what makes leaders. But while trustworthiness has dominated scholarly discussions of the antecedents of trust, there is increasing consensus that we need to take a broader view. While trust motivation (i.e., the desire to be vulnerable in order to build or maintain particular relationships), has become a theme in theoretical discussions of trust, there remains a lack of empirical evidence testing these ideas. In response, we empirically test the role of trust motivation as an antecedent for trust in leaders across three experimental studies; we present two of the studies here and outline one which is planned to be completed prior to FINT 2022.