Institutional and social trust across eight countries: distribution across sociodemographic groups and relevance for population health

Trust is increasingly recognized as a key determinant of population health. However, there remains a paucity of recent literature documenting the levels and distribution of social and institutional trust across global contexts in the post-pandemic period. We assessed trust in various entities across eight countries and different sociodemographic groups. The Global Social Determinants of Health Study (GSDS) collected nationally representative data in Brazil, France, India, Indonesia, Nigeria, the Philippines, Türkiye, and the US (November 2023–February 2024), using probability-based sampling with post-stratification weighting. We assessed trust in government, international organizations, scientists/academia, corporations, mass media, and social trust (“most people in the country”) across sociodemographic groups using binary logistic regression, with robustness checks using proportional odds logistic regression and multiple imputation for missing data. Among 8,198 adults, high trust was greatest in scientists/academia (61.2%, 95% CI: 59.9–62.4%), followed by corporations (37.9%, 95% CI: 36.6–39.2%), international organizations (37.4%, 95% CI: 36.2–38.7%), mass media (33.8%, 95% CI: 32.6–35.0%), government (32.6%, 95% CI: 31.4–33.9%), and social trust in “most people in the country” (32.2%, 95% CI: 30.9–33.4%). Higher educational attainment was generally inversely associated with institutional trust, except for scientists/academia where those with higher education had greater trust. People in the lowest income quintile had lower odds of trust in scientists/academia (OR: 0.79, 95% CI: 0.64–0.98) compared with the highest quintile. Trust varied across countries, with India showing consistently higher trust across all institutions. Interaction analyses revealed that the association between education and trust varied by country and income level. Low institutional and social trust may challenge efforts to improve population health, given the documented role of trust as a health determinant. High trust in scientists/academia presents an opportunity to rebuild institutional trust and advance population health policies through academic partnerships and co-branding of public health messages.