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Exploring the Measurement of Political Trust: A Multilevel Observational Analysis of Six Swedish Public Agencies

136 Pages Posted: 2 Jan 2023 Publication Status: Accepted

See all articles by Oskar Rydén

Oskar Rydén

University of Gothenburg

Karl De Fine Licht

Chalmers University of Technology

Björn Rönnerstrand

University of Gothenburg

Niklas Harring

University of Gothenburg - Centre for Collective Action (CeCAR)

Bengt Brüld

University of Gothenburg - Department of Philosophy, Linguistics & Theory of Science

Sverker C. Jagers

University of Gothenburg - Department of Political Science

Abstract

Political trust is a well-used construct and serves both as an explanation and an outcome in the social sciences. Considering the importance of the construct,relatively little attention has been allocated to its measurement. While the existing literature on the measurement of political trust focuses on either developing and validating new scales, or scaling and equivalence assessment of the more general measures, this article contributes by analysing the contents of the widely used survey items of political trust. Put differently, what is in a typical political trust measure? The analysis uses relevant observational data from Sweden (n = 1760)with repeated questions over six public agencies, where the typically used trust measurement is regressed on theoretically motivated psychological antecedents of trust using a hierarchical heteroskedastic ordered probit model. Results imply that the typical trust measurement contains traces of perceived competence and less so perceived motivation. The results also suggest that political actor sdo carry meaning beyond the trust construct, influencing both the location and scale of the response distribution.

Keywords: Political Trust, Measurement, bayesian mixed effect scale-location, Sweden, survey data

Suggested Citation

Rydén, Oskar and De Fine Licht, Karl and Rönnerstrand, Björn and Harring, Niklas and Brüld, Bengt and Jagers, Sverker C., Exploring the Measurement of Political Trust: A Multilevel Observational Analysis of Six Swedish Public Agencies. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4316518 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4316518

Oskar Rydén (Contact Author)

University of Gothenburg ( email )

Karl De Fine Licht

Chalmers University of Technology ( email )

Gothenburg
SE-412 96 Goteborg
Sweden

Björn Rönnerstrand

University of Gothenburg ( email )

Viktoriagatan 30
Göteborg, 405 30
Sweden

Niklas Harring

University of Gothenburg - Centre for Collective Action (CeCAR) ( email )

Box 100, S-405 30
Gothenburg
Sweden

Bengt Brüld

University of Gothenburg - Department of Philosophy, Linguistics & Theory of Science ( email )

Box 200
Gothenburg, 40530
Sweden

Sverker C. Jagers

University of Gothenburg - Department of Political Science ( email )

Box 711
Göteborg, S-405 30
Sweden

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