The economic approach towards trust gives suggestions how a causal role of trust could be established experimentally. And the biological and behavioral evidence indicating that trusting is not just a special case of risk-taking, but based on important forms of social preferences such as betrayal aversion. The results show that a high level of trust is an important determinant of the effectiveness of cooperation as well as a key component of reducing transaction costs.

Keywords: trust, cooperation, transaction costs, public good, construction