---
title: "Social Trust"
description: "That's the percent of the American public who say that generally speaking most people can be trusted. But a slightly larger number, 50%, say that \"you can't be too careful in dealing with people.\""
date: "2007-04-09"
authors:
  - name: "Russell Heimlich"
    job_title: "Former web developer"
    link: "https://www.pewresearch.org/staff/russell-heimlich/"
url: "https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2007/04/09/social-trust/"
---

# Social Trust

Americans are closely divided on the question of whether most people can be trusted or whether you can’t be too careful in dealing with others; 45% of respondents in a Pew Social Trends survey say the former, while 50% say the latter. These responses have fluctuated very little during the four decades that survey research organizations have been asking this question, save for a period in the 1990s when measured levels of interpersonal trust dipped for a number of years. But since then, social trust has rebounded to roughly the same level it had been before the trough. [Read More](https://www.pewresearch.org/pubs/414/americans-and-social-trust-who-where-and-why)