A SOCIAL DILEMMA ANALYSIS OF COMMUTING PREFERENCES - THE ROLES OF SOCIAL VALUE ORIENTATION AND TRUST

The current research advances a social dilemma analysis of commuting, examining the roles of preexisting personality differences in social v alue orientation (i.e., prosociaI vs. proself orientation) and trust ( i.e., a general belief in the honesty and cooperative intentions of ot hers) in determining preferences for collectively desirable commuting options: preferences for commuting by public transportation (Study 1) and carpooling (Study 2). Consistent with predictions, both studies re vealed that, relative to preferences of prosocials, preferences of pro selfs were more strongly associated with beliefs about the relative ef ficiency of cars (i.e., an outcome affecting personal well-being). Als o, greater preferences for collectively desirable actions were observe d among prosocials with high trust-relative to prosocials with low tru st and proselfs with high or low trust-providing support for the claim that 2 conditions (i.e., prosocial goals and trust in others) must be met to obtain collectively desirable commuting preferences.