ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that trust is central to all positive relationships. It suggests that reader views of trust—those based on a social exchange perspective—are insufficient for understanding trust in these relationships. A social exchange perspective provides limited theoretical leverage for understanding how trust can be rebuilt, beyond the observation that trust occurs—and by extrapolation, might possibly be rebuilt—over a series of exchanges. However, an exchange perspective might even suggest that once trust is broken, the exchange relationship would likely terminate. The chapter discusses the implications of using a relationship-based commitment perspective for restoring trust. Relationship-based commitment and trust appear to have much in common. Relationship-based commitment, trust involves the simultaneous existence of both positive and negative elements. In a commitment-based view, by contrast, these positive and negative elements associated with trust do not "cancel out" to reveal either a positive or a negative relationship; rather both positive and negative elements are simultaneously present in all trust relationships.
