Trust in the Construction Industry: A Literature Review

Although tremendous focus in management research is placed on new construction technologies, the social and human factors through which these technologies are implemented often are neglected. An increasing trend in construction management research is seen in soft management aspects, such as trust. This basically developed from the fact that construction projects involve individuals and their beliefs. Construction projects are based on collaboration among contracting parties to accomplish project goals. Thus, it is crucial to build teams quickly and establish good communications among team members. Trust has been determined by many studies as an excellent determinant to successful projects and crucial to building integrated project teams. The aim of this paper is to present a literature review of research on trust in construction, identify knowledge gaps, and suggest recommendations for future research. More than 50 peer-reviewed publications were reviewed through which six main lines of research were identified. Research in trust in construction seems to focus primarily on four main areas: trust types, factors affecting trust development, trust effect on project success, and relational contracting. Yet there still exists knowledge gap in areas of nonrelational agreements, North American construction markets; and project cost, risk, and contracts' relations to trust.