质疑“社会上大多数人”作为置信对象

Is it Rational to Use “Most People in Society” as One of the Multivariate Trustees in Measuring Social Trust? - An Empirical Analysis Based on a Survey at BNU

在关于社会信任度的调查问卷中，“社会上大多数人”是一个常用的置信对象。本文的分析表明：“社会上大多数人”属于“外人”范畴，与“自己人”相对立，可以作为单一指标用来测量与特殊信任相对的普遍信任水平，但不能直接用来进行国际比较；如果采用多元指标测量社会信任水平，“社会上大多数人”也不适合作为并列的置信对象列入。

In the questionnaires on social trust level, “most people in society” is often used as a trustee. The analysis of this paper shows that, for the respondents in Chinese context, “most people in society” belongs to their “outsiders”, in opposition to their “insiders”. Therefore, “most people in society” can be used as a single trustee to measure generalized trust, which results yet can’t be compared to the international. If multivariate trustees are applied to measure social trust, this paper claims that “most people in society” is not suitable for a parallel trustee.