Revisiting Trustworthiness in Social Interaction

Description

Bringing together trust research, rhetoric, ethnomethodology and conversation analysis, this book formulates an analytical program for conceptualizing and defining trustworthiness as an empirical research object in social interaction. Revisiting Trustworthiness in Social Interaction examines trustworthiness as a relational and dynamic concept. It reviews sociological and rhetorical approaches to the study of trustworthiness and respecifies it as an interactional phenomenon displayed, tested and negotiated by participants in social interaction. It identifies four participant orientations of trustworthiness that may be foregrounded in peoples’ dynamic identity projects, and it defines the phenomena 'character-bound displays' and 'sequential negotiation of character', both indicative of participants’ orientation to trustworthiness. In this way, the book turns the theoretical concept of trustworthiness into an empirical object of interaction analysis, pointing to a vast number of interactional indicators, which allow interaction analysts to explore if and how interactants orient to trustworthiness in an encounter. Exemplary cases from both mundane and institutional encounters are analyzed using ethnomethodological multimodal conversation analysis showing how trustworthiness is done, challenges, achived, negotiated and lost in interaction. The intended audiences are scholars of conversation analysis, ethnomethodology, rhetoric and the social sciences, especially communication, organizational and leadership studies, and their students. Cover Half Title Series Title Copyright Table of Contents 1 Introduction Trust is a concern for all Exploring trustworthiness from an EM/CA perspective Focusing on participants’ sensorially observable actions, rather than their motives Standing on the shoulders of trust research and rhetoric 2 Doing EM/CA research on inferred social phenomena Show it in the data Nobody is claiming that ‘the surface’ of discourse is all there is Social identity is a research object ‘Member’s competence’ entails doing inferential work Conduct formulations are inferences from conduct Recipient design requires inferential work Participants’ interactional projects are recognized in the interaction as such CA studies of inferences from conduct Courtroom interaction Press conferences Studies on empathy Displays of irritation and disappointment in everyday interaction Concluding discussion 3 Defining trustworthiness as an interactional phenomenon Approaches to the study of trust and trustworthiness Approaches to trustworthiness in rhetoric research Approaches to trustworthiness in social science trust research Approaches to trustworthiness in psychology Approaches to aspects of trustworthiness in discursive psychology Approaching trustworthiness within EM/CA A theoretical conceptualization of trustworthiness Rhetoric work on conceptualizing trustworthiness Conceptualizing trustworthiness in social science trust research Conceptualizing trustworthiness in psychology Trust and trustworthiness in ethnomethodology Our work on conceptualizing components of trustworthiness Basic premises in our approach to trustworthiness as an empirical concept Trustworthiness is an identity project for interactants Participant orientations comprise the analytical object Social actions, moves and interactional strategies are codable Interactional actions, moves and strategies are situated in a sequential context Social character as an identity project is subject to dynamic negotiation Local identity projects may be foregrounded and backgrounded Looking for noticeable absence, misplacement and breaches of norms Defining trustworthiness as a social phenomenon Identifying orientation to trustworthiness in social interaction Social actions may be character-bound displays (CBDs) Character-bound displays may have different sequential positions Character may be sequentially negotiated (SNOC) Recognizing clusters of indicators is a member’s competence Character-bound displays (CBDs) do not equal character Summary 4 Methodology Methodology for studying trustworthiness in rhetoric Methodology for studying trustworthiness broadly in trust research Our methodology Analytical focus Data 5 Orientation to truth and honesty The truth Accepting things as the truth Negotiating the quality or truthfulness of facts and information The whole truth Creating openness and transparency and giving access to information Doing being honest by volunteering unflattering facts and information Orienting to detail and precision Pursuing response in cases of reluctance and minimalism Relevance Nothing but the truth Being fishy by giving too much information, detail and precision Miscrediting others’ versions Detecting lies: misplacement markers and unfitted responses Summing up the orientation to truth and honesty 6 Orientation to stake and interest Is something always at stake? Stance, neutrality and subjectivity Displaying, denying and negotiating bias Negotiating benefactive status Negotiations of role compliance and living up to expectations Conflicts, misconducts, blamings and complaints Politeness and saving others’ face Summing up the orientation to stake and interest 7 Orientation to knowledge and ability Why knowledge and competence build trustworthiness Accepting knowledge Confronting knowledge Negotiating and evaluating degrees of knowledge Negotiating the quality of sources of knowledge Negotiating primacy of knowledge: the right to know better Coming off as a knowledgeable insider Flashing knowledge to bolster trustworthiness Testing others’ knowledge Miscrediting others by spotlighting their lack of knowledge Using lack of knowledge as a resource for escaping responsibility Why ability, capacity, mandate and entitlement build trustworthiness Accepting others’ ability Confronting others’ ability Doubting trustworthiness by confronting ability Negotiating and assessing ability and capacity Using lack of mandate as a resource for rejection Concluding discussion of orientation to knowledge and ability 8 Orientation to consistency and predictability Doing being normal provides social-systemic predictability Predictability and experience Predictability and interactional projectivity Predictability and role compliance Claims of deviant behavior and inconsistency as defense material Predictability of untrustworthiness as last resort Summing up the orientation to consistency and predictability as a member’s concern 9 Concluding discussion Our theoretical and empirical contribution Four orientations Character-bound displays and clusters of indicators Sequential negotiation of character and socially distributed clusters Indicators of orientations to trustworthiness Our contribution to prior research Discussion of our theoretical and empirical conceptualization Some orientations are more basic than others Overlapping orientations Discussion of the empirical approach When is a display a display? Baseline required – and debatable Choice of data Breaches of norms, trustworthiness and perspicuous settings Coding what is missing Coding an action depends on the local and global context Defining clusters of indicators Participant versus analyst resources for determining components of trustworthiness Time will test our project of revisiting trustworthiness Our trustworthiness as scholars, or the credibility of our study Methodological prospects of our study Cross-disciplinary verifications of our study Practical application? Future research awaits References for the monograph: Revisiting Trustworthiness in Social Interaction Index