The DOI matches its Crossref record; 171 of the 178 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Does Oxytocin Increase Trust in Humans? A Critical Review of Research
Abstract
Behavioral neuroscientists have shown that the neuropeptide oxytocin (OT) plays a key role in social attachment and affiliation in nonhuman mammals. Inspired by this initial research, many social scientists proceeded to examine the associations of OT with trust in humans over the past decade. To conduct this work, they have (a) examined the effects of exogenous OT increase caused by intranasal administration on trusting behavior, (b) correlated individual difference measures of OT plasma levels with measures of trust, and (c) searched for genetic polymorphisms of the OT receptor gene that might be associated with trust. We discuss the different methods used by OT behavioral researchers and review evidence that links OT to trust in humans. Unfortunately, the simplest promising finding associating intranasal OT with higher trust has not replicated well. Moreover, the plasma OT evidence is flawed by how OT is measured in peripheral bodily fluids. Finally, in recent large-sample studies, researchers failed to find consistent associations of specific OT-related genetic polymorphisms and trust. We conclude that the cumulative evidence does not provide robust convergent evidence that human trust is reliably associated with OT (or caused by it). We end with constructive ideas for improving the robustness and rigor of OT research.
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In the citing paper
“Nave and colleagues [22] computed the effect sizes of seven studies that have investigated the effect of intranasal OT on trust trough the trust game. Their analysis revealed that the combined effect size of intranasal OT on trust was small and not reliably different from zero (Cohen’s d = 0.077, 95%CI: [-0.124;0.278]).”
From Failed Replication of Oxytocin Effects on Trust: The Envelope Task Case (2015) · cites this paper as [22]
In the citing paper
“The lack of a convincing theoretical framework that allows to predict which moderators exert their effects and when, has raised healthy skepticism regarding the robustness of human behavioral IN-OT research (20,21).”
From Is there a Publication Bias in Behavioural Intranasal Oxytocin Research on Humans? Opening the File Drawer of One Laboratory (2016) · cites this paper as [20]
In the citing paper
“the seminal, highly cited study associating IN-OT with trust (1), that inspired much of the subsequent research, failed several times to replicate (20).”
From Is there a Publication Bias in Behavioural Intranasal Oxytocin Research on Humans? Opening the File Drawer of One Laboratory (2016) · cites this paper as [20]
In the citing paper
“the use of too small samples (21) and the vast amount of candidate factors that could potentially moderate IN-OT's behavioral effects (19, 20) might inflate the false discovery rate unless direct replication efforts and correction for multiple hypotheses are applied.”
From Is there a Publication Bias in Behavioural Intranasal Oxytocin Research on Humans? Opening the File Drawer of One Laboratory (2016) · cites this paper as [20]
In the citing paper
“A concern in previous studies is that post hoc explorations of different modulations by individual differences risk inflating the rate of Type I errors 50 .”
From Oxytocin modulates social value representations in the amygdala (2019) · cites this paper as [50]
In the citing paper
“More specifically, Nave and colleagues 21 have raised doubt on the robustness of the oxytocin-trust association, pointing out that six studies failed to replicate the initial findings reported by Kosfeld et al. 8 .”
From A registered replication study on oxytocin and trust (2020) · cites this paper as [21]
In the citing paper
“The overarching link among studies of OXT and human cooperation is the role of OXT in enhancing group-level cooperation, though there is considerable debate about the robustness of these OXT studies (Leng & Ludwig, 2015; Nave, Camerer, & McCullough, 2015; Van IJzendoorn & Bakermans-Kranenburg, 2012; Walum, Waldman, & Young, 2015).”
From Inequity aversion strategies between marmosets are influenced by partner familiarity and sex but not by oxytocin (2016) · cites this paper as Nave, Camerer, & McCullough, 2015
In the citing paper
“However, several recent reviews identified relatively poor replicability within the OT literature (Nave et al., 2015; Leng and Ludwig, 2016; Walum et al., 2016), which partly arises from small sample sizes.”
From Oxytocin promotes altruistic punishment (2017) · cites this paper as Nave et al., 2015
In the citing paper
“For instance, a recent systematic review of the oxytocin literature found no evidence that trust behavior is associated with oxytocin (Nave et al., 2015).”
From Oxytocin promotes altruistic punishment (2017) · cites this paper as Nave et al., 2015
Citations
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“It is also impossible to know whether there exist unpublished data that produced null findings and got stuck in the proverbial “file drawer” (because of publication bias; e.g., Lane, Luminet, Nave, & Mikolajczak, 2015; Rosenthal, 1979).”
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Self-citationOxytocin increases trust in humans
Kosfeld, M., Heinrichs, M., Zak, P. J., Fischbacher, U., & Fehr, E. (2005) · Nature · doi:10.1038/nature03701 · Cited by 3,690
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Cited by
Sorted by citations
Music as a coevolved system for social bonding
Savage, P. E., Loui, P., Tarr, B., Schachner, A., Glowacki, L., Mithen, S., & Fitch, W. T. (2020) · Behavioral and Brain Sciences · doi:10.1017/s0140525x20000333 · Cited by 662
Measurement of trust in automation: A narrative review and reference guide
Kohn, S. C., de Visser, E. J., Wiese, E., Lee, Y.-C., & Shaw, T. H. (2021) · Frontiers in Psychology · doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2021.604977 · Cited by 315
“…oxytocin methodological and experimental approach due to reproducibility difficulties and the exploratory nature of this work (Christensen et al., 2014; Nave et al., 2015; Mierop et al., 2020), a validated hormone-based measure would present a third broad type of physiological trust measurement.”
BackgroundMusical Preferences Predict Personality: Evidence From Active Listening and Facebook Likes
Nave, G., Minxha, J., Greenberg, D. M., Kosiński, M., Stillwell, D. J., & Rentfrow, P. J. (2018) · Psychological Science · doi:10.1177/0956797618761659 · Cited by 209
Self-citationSynchrony as an Adaptive Mechanism for Large‐Scale Human Social Bonding
Launay, J., Tarr, B., & Dunbar, R. (2016) · Ethology · doi:10.1111/eth.12528 · Cited by 218
“…out-groups (Shamay-Tsoory et al. 2013), with individual differences predicting some of this variability in behaviour (Ma et al. 2015) This suggests that the effects of oxytocin generalise beyond dyadic bonding, although more research is required to fully clarify these effects (Nave et al. 2015).”
Variability in Human-Animal Interaction Research
Rodriguez, K. E., Herzog, H., & Gee, N. R. (2021) · Frontiers in Veterinary Science · doi:10.3389/fvets.2020.619600 · Cited by 213
“These include the impact of nasal oxytocin administration on interpersonal trust (15), changes in female mate preferences associated with ovulation (16), and the egodepletion model of self-control (17).”
Background
Metadata
- Authors
- Nave, G., Camerer, C., & McCullough, M.
- Affiliations
- California Institute of Technology (US)
- University of Miami (US)
- Corresponding author
- Nave, Gideon
- Venue
- Perspectives on Psychological Science
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2015-11
- Volume
- 10
- Issue
- 6
- Pages
- 772-789
- ISSN
- 1745-6916 (ISSN-L)
- 1745-6924
- OpenAlex
- W2189156543
- Semantic Scholar
- 3aadb7002f83415c5b398a6a122c7ce14599dc24
- Cited by
- 316
- References
- 178
- Citations by year
- 2026: 9 · 2025: 8 · 2024: 15 · 2023: 21 · 2022: 24 · 2021: 44 · 2020: 51 · 2019: 44 · 2018: 27 · 2017: 48 · 2016: 23 · 2015: 2
- FWCI
- 3.29
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Perspectives on Psychological Science (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- CaltechAUTHORS (California Institute of Technology) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Endocrine and Autonomic Systems › Neuroendocrine regulation and behavior
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Evolutionary Psychology and Human Behavior
- Social Sciences › Economics, Econometrics and Finance › Economics and Econometrics › Experimental Behavioral Economics Studies
- Keywords
- oxytocin, trust, individual differences, replication, research rigor, social attachment, neuropeptides
- MeSH terms
- Administration, Intranasal, Genetic Markers, Humans, Oxytocin, Polymorphism, Genetic, Biomarkers, Receptors, Oxytocin, Trust
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