Human Values and Trust in Institutions across Countries: A Multilevel Test of Schwartz's Hypothesis of Structural Equivalence

Abstract

The goal of this article was to show how structural equation modelling associated to multilevel regressions represents a powerful tool to examine innovative cross-cultural research questions. The relationship between values and trust in institutions was investigated in four cross-cultural datasets: three were students and teacher samples; the last was a general sample from the 2005 World Values Survey (WVS). The hypothesis of equivalence of the structure of relations between values and trust in institutions (sinusoid curve hypothesis) was tested with a series of multilevel multiple indicators and multiple causes models with random slopes. Structural equivalence was confirmed for student samples, but not for the general sample. The between-country variance of the relationship between values and trust in the general sample was partially explained by country level differences in socio-economic wealth and quality of governance.