Reciprocity is a well-known influence on international cooperation. However, we lack an explanation for how reciprocity at the international level affects individual beliefs and attitudes. How do people interpret situations where countries return favors, or fail to? In this study, we present a micro-level explanation of reciprocity based on the theoretical framework of Unbounded Generalized Reciprocity, where reciprocity operates as an informational shortcut about the trustworthiness of others. In an experimental survey of US adults, we test the roles of exposure to between-country reciprocity, perceived similarity, and costliness on trust toward a counterpart country, using the context of cooperation during the COVID-19 pandemic. We find that reciprocity, compared to a reciprocity violation, predicted significantly more trust, and this was not moderated by similarity or costliness. We interpret these results as supporting evidence that reciprocity, at the individual-level, acts as a heuristic tool for determining the trustworthiness of other countries.

中文翻译：

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互惠对信任的影响：国际合作和 COVID 援助


互惠关系对国际合作的影响是众所周知的。然而，我们缺乏对国际层面互惠如何影响个人信仰和态度的解释。人们如何解释国家回报或未能回报的情况？在这项研究中，我们基于无界广义互惠的理论框架提出了互惠的微观层面解释，其中互惠作为关于他人可信度的信息捷径。在一项针对美国成年人的实验性调查中，我们使用 COVID-19 大流行期间的合作背景，测试了国家间互惠、感知相似性和对对方国家信任的成本的影响。我们发现，与互惠违规相比，互惠预示着信任度明显更高，而这并没有受到相似性或成本的调节。我们将这些结果解释为支持证据，即互惠在个人层面上是确定其他国家可信度的启发式工具。