Dynamics of Trust - Trust Theory: A Socio-Cognitive and Computational Model - page 155

Delegation

DoT XY =
trustworthiness(Y )

+

X

Y

Trustworthiness (Y ) = z +
with positive or negative

DoT' XY

X

Figure 6.7 Changed Degree of Trust anticipated in strong-delegation. (Reproduced with kind permis-
sion of Springer Science+Business Media C

2001)

6.3.3 Anticipated Effects: A Planned Dynamics
This is the case in which the delegating agent X takes into account the possible effects of its
'strong delegation' and of the act of trusting (which becomes per se a 'signal'; Section 2.2.7)
on Y 's trustworthiness, in her decision, before she performs the delegation action. In this way,
X changes her degree of trust in Y(DoT XY τ ) before the delegation and on the basis of this her
own action (Figure 6.7).
We analyze two cases:

i) the new degree of trust ( DoT' XY τ ) is greater than the old one ( DoT XY τ ): DoT' XY τ > DoT XY τ ;

ii) the new degree of trust is lesser than the old one: DoT' XY τ < DoT XY τ .

) we can analyze the various cases by
crossing the change of the DoT with the values of the threshold.
In other words, before performing a delegation action, an agent X could evaluate the (positive
or negative) influence that its delegation will have on Y 's trustworthiness and if this influence
is relevant for either overcoming or undergoing the minimum level for delegating. In Table
6.2, all the possible situations and the consequent decisions of X are considered.

Introducing a minimum threshold to delegate ( σ