by Judith Torney-Purta, Wendy Klandl Richardson, and Carolyn Henry Barber

August 2004

“The purpose of this paper is to examine different facets of trust in the political system or civic realm and how they are correlated to the expected civic or political engagement of young people. The nature and effects of trust in social and political institutions have been studied in adults, distinguishing between various types of trust (in institutions compared with more generalized trust in people). Few studies have focused on how trust affects the political socialization of children and adolescents, who are in the process of developing their attitudes towards government and other social institutions. Our analysis uses data collected in 1999 from the IEA Civic Education Study of 14-year-olds to examine trust at three levels—trust in institutions with which individuals have little or no daily contact (those delegated as representatives in institutions such as the national legislature), trust in institutions with whose representatives individuals interact frequently (schools), and trust in other people.”

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