学经济学降低人际信任?经济类专业学习对大学生人际信任的影响

Does Knowledge of Economics Encourage Interpersonal Distrust? Impact of Economic Learning on Interpersonal Trust in Undergraduates

本研究试图证明,经济类专业学习会降低大学生的人际信任。研究者测量了某财经类重点高校经济类和非经济类专业的大一和大三共290名本科生的人际信任水平,发现专业类型和年级存在显著交互作用,大一的经济类学生和非经济类学生在人际信任水平上无显著差异,而大三的经济类学生在人际信任水平上却显著低于非经济类专业。这说明经济类专业学习时间的增加可能是学生人际信任水平下降的原因,可能的机制是,学习经济学会使个体逐渐接受和认同"理性人假设"所包含的人性观点,认为他人的行为都是基于自私和功利的目的。

The main purpose of this study was to examine whether the study of economics knowledge may reduce the level of interpersonal trust of undergraduates. The researchers measured the levels of interpersonal trust of 290 freshmen and junior-year college students in economics or non-economics majors in a key university of finance and economics. The results showed that there was a significant interaction between major and grade： for freshmen, no significant difference in the level of interpersonal trust was found between economics and noneconomics majors; however, for junior-year students, the interpersonal trust level of students majoring in economics was much lower than that of noneconomics-majors. This finding implies that increasing learning of economics knowledge results in decreases in students’ interpersonal trust. A reasonable explanation is that students’ view of the essence of humanity is shaped by Rational Man Hypothesis embodied in the economics major, which emphasizes the selfish and utilitarian purpose of human behaviors.