Political trust on COVID-19 handling as predictor towards optimism on the new normal situation: Integrity and benevolence rather than competence

Abstract

Covid-19 has turned into a global health issue since April 2020 where WHO finally decided the spread of the virus as a global pandemic that affected more than 200 countries. Previous works have found that trust toward the government is important in adapting to the pandemic situation. However, what type of trust is more important? This study aims to investigate the role of different domains of trust towards Covid-19 treatment conducted by the Indonesian government as a predictor for the perception of the new normal situation. The result shows that higher trust towards government will lead to optimism in facing the new normal situation, in which perceived integrity and benevolence become the significant predictors toward optimism. However, we did not find the same pattern for the competence domain of trust.