Trust among Academicians: An Empirical Study

Trust is a very important characteristic of any relationship be it a personal relationship or a professional relationship. Presence of trust in any professional setup is important as it brings faith and confidence in a relationship. It helps people to work in a safe and healthy environment. Therefore, it becomes essential to have such an environment in which members trust each other. This study is an attempt to access the importance of trust and whether it exists among the teaching members of an educational institution. A survey was conducted among the professional courses’ teaching staff of the Faculty of Medicine, Faculty of Engineering, and Faculty of Management Studies and Research, of Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh."Affect based trust and cognition-based trust" were independent variables, whereas knowledge sharing and strong bonding between the academicians were dependent variables."Exploratory Factor Analysis, Confirmatory Factor Analysis, and Structural Equation modelling were used as tools of analysis."The results of the study show that there is a positive relationship between "affect-based trust and knowledge sharing intention", between "cognition-based trust and knowledge sharing intention", and between "knowledge sharing intention and strong bonding".