College Education and Social Trust: An Evidence-Based Study on the Causal Mechanisms |
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Authors: | Jian Huang Henriëtte Maassen van den Brink Wim Groot |
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Institution: | (1) Top Institute Evidence Based Education Research, Department of General Economics (TIER), University of Amsterdam, Room 3.67, Building E, Roetersstraat 11, 1018 WB Amsterdam, The Netherlands;(2) Top Institute Evidence Based Education Research, Department of General Economics (TIER), University of Amsterdam, Room 11.05, Building E, Roetersstraat 11, 1018 WB Amsterdam, The Netherlands;(3) TIER Top Institute Evidence Based Education Research, Department of Health, Medicine and Life Sciences, Maastricht University, P.O. Box 616, 6200 MD Maastricht, The Netherlands |
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Abstract: | This paper examines the influence of college education on social trust at the individual level. Based on the literature of
trust and social trust, we hypothesize that life experience/development since adulthood and perceptions of cultural/social
structures are two primary channels in the causal linkage between college education and social trust. In the first part of
the empirical study econometric techniques are employed to tackle the omitted-variable problem and substantial evidence is
found to confirm the positive effect of college education. In the second part contemporary information is used to examine
the hypothetical mechanisms in the causal inference. That life experience is a primary channel via which college education
promotes social trust fails to find support in our examination, while individual perceptions of cultural and social structures
explain up to 77% of the causal effect. |
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Keywords: | |
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