The Formation Of Online Interpersonal Trust In Strangers

Microblog not only plays a role of information dissemination and exchange, but also becomes a new tool of social communication with rapid development of information technology nowadays. It’s worth to make a further research about trust relationship through the dissemination of information with fragmented language in virtual space with the features of getting people together and pulling people away. This research based on the formation of a group-buying people on microblog and discuss online interpersonal trust comes from it. Based on the formation of a group-buying people on microblog, this research discusses formation of online interpersonal trust including its mechanism, path, stage, type, and the whole model. The research shows that the group-buying people is based on two important roles called “group leader” and “group member” which use symbolic information to role-playing and thus form the group. The online interpersonal trust engendered between “group leader” and “group member” is generated from integrated effect of the mechanism of subjectivity, objectivity and interaction including system of approaching trust, special similarity, more excellent index, humanized organization, reciprocal experience and the third party. As the trust relationship in group-buying develops with the time, it shapes three paths: the progressive trend, the fluctuant trend and the terminated trend. The three paths have common stages called initial trust stage and continuous trust stage. These two stages are different in terms of interaction and mechanism which results in different types of online interpersonal trust including enthusiastic trust, habitus trust and strategic trust.