I was in To the Postal Savings Bank. A simple reason: to open a dinar account. The first question is already a trick-question: "What kind." account do you want?” Of course, I ask, "And what kinds are there?" "I have to ask a colleague," he says, and then directs me to that colleague.
After everything, I go back to him at the counter where he makes me sign about 40 papers. He quickly slips them away, not allowing me to read what is written on them. I say, "Will you give me a copy of all this?" "I won't, I don't have time to copy, nor is anyone asking for it," he snapped, as if I were looking for something scandalous, not elementary.
And there, in that scene that is both banal and creepy, it becomes clear: trust is not something that is built on ideas and declarations, but on letting you read what you are signing. And if that doesn't exist either, then what is left?
Because what is seen on the counter is repeated in society: small arbitrariness as a mirror of large systems. And as I leave, I think that all the psychological-sociological theories about social capital, mental health and trust can be tested there, between the stamp and the paper.
Trust in institutions and the mental health crisis
Trust in institutions is not a phrase from a political theory textbook. It is the daily bread of a society: invisible, but necessary. When trust exists, it is almost invisible.
When it disappears, the silence that held him disappears, and with it the feeling that the world is predictable.
Trust is not security. On the contrary, it lives in a space of uncertainty. It is necessary precisely because we do not know. The citizen believes that the institution (court, hospital, police, ministry) will act in his interest, consistently and predictably.
That trust is the bridge between the individual and the system. And when the bridge collapses, not only words and papers fall, but also a sense of personal stability.
Research shows that people with higher levels of trust in institutions and community report more subjective well-being, better mental health, and longer life expectancy. That's logical.
Trust reduces stress, gives a sense of control, and encourages cooperation. But when trust melts away, the consequences are not just political. They are embedded in everyday life: anxiety grows, suspicion spreads, the feeling of isolation becomes the norm.
The period from 2021 to 2024 in the US shows a trend of declining confidence in most sectors. Of particular concern is that Gen Z — those just entering social and political maturity — are already reporting lower levels of trust than older generations.
This gap is not only measured by polls, but also by changes in behavior: avoiding the use of government services, refusing to participate in joint initiatives, up to the complete withdrawal from public space.
Chronic stress
Psychologists warn that loss of trust has the characteristics of chronic stress. It's not a sudden trauma, but a steady drip of uncertainty. When a citizen believes that the system will not respond to his complaint, when he suspects that the hospital is susceptible to corruption or that the court rules along political lines, he actually lives in a constant "state of alert" - the body and mind familiar from the literature on anxiety disorders.
Sociologists like Robert Putnam and Bo Rothstein add that trust is not an isolated feeling, but rather social capital: the web of relationships, rules, and expectations that hold a community together. When that network weakens, both the individual and society become more vulnerable.
Anthony Giddens goes further: in the modern world we rely more and more on "abstract systems", institutions and processes that we do not fully see and understand, but we must trust. When that mechanism fails, not only politics collapses, but also ontological certainty, the fundamental sense that the world makes sense and is subject to reason.
The loss of trust is, therefore, a double crisis: political from the outside, psychological from the inside. And that inner dimension often remains invisible, because it does not produce spectacular images (there are no demonstrations or protests).
There is only a silent change: a person stops addressing the system, stops expecting, stops believing.
And this is where the most dangerous process begins: a society where trust becomes a luxury for the naive, not a foundation for everyone.
How the loss of trust eats into our nerves
When trust breaks, it doesn't just break on a screen, in a chart or in a news headline. Shoots in a man.
And man, although he likes to think that he is standing on the ground, actually lives in a network — a network of relationships, norms, invisible signals. Robert D. Putnam called that network social capital. Something that is not money, and without which money loses its meaning.
Putnam says: social capital is trust, norms and networks. In America, he says, that network has thinned out. People stopped bowling in leagues (Bowling Alone), stopped sitting with neighbors, stopped going to association meetings. It seems harmless on paper. In the flesh, very seriously.
Because every withdrawal from the common space does not mean only less handshakes and conversations, but also less psychological and biological processes that require contact, and those processes are immune impulses, hormonal balances, heart rhythms.
Ichiro Kawachi adds: social capital is measured in both minds and bodies. It measures trust, sense of belonging, willingness to exchange. And the findings: those with more of that capital report better physical and mental health. Even when we remove the genetics, the childhood, the character, the connection remains. This means that social capital is a public health resource, not just a cultural beauty.
Pamela Paxton warns that not every network is good. Associations locked in their bubbles can work against democracy. The quality of connections is important, not just the number. Because misplaced trust can feed exclusivity, fanaticism, blind faith.
Trust as a weakness
And here we come to the dark side of trust. When it is too high, when it is uncalibrated, it becomes a weakness. One stops doubting. It fits. He leaves his eyes to another, trusting that he will tell him the truth.
That's what psychologists call compensatory trust: when we believe not because the institution deserves it, but because we cannot bear to live without faith. And the institutions — they know that. And they can feed him, because high trust means less supervision, less questions, more obedience.
But the most dangerous part of the story begins when that undeserved trust is broken. Disappointment then is not only intellectual. It's a physiological shock. You lose security, and with it the basic feeling that the world makes sense. Anthony Giddens would call it erosion of ontological security: you lose the ground under your feet that you didn't even know you had.
Ontological security is not a luxury, but an everyday breathing apparatus. As long as you trust the institutions, they invisibly maintain your rhythm: tomorrow the water will flow from the tap, the doctor will prescribe a medicine that cures you, the court will defend you if you are right.
When trust is gone, each of those acts becomes a lottery. And man begins to live in a world where air is measured in bottles, and one cannot breathe freely.
Psychology turns into biology here. The body recognizes distrust as a threat. HPA axis is activated: hypothalamus, pituitary gland, adrenal glands. Cortisol enters the blood. If it goes on for a long time, the cortisol level does not go down. Immunity weakens, inflammation increases, blood sugar jumps, the brain changes. Depression, anxiety, cognitive decline, all that is no longer a metaphor, but exactly measured in millimoles and milligrams.
Dopamine, the reward neurotransmitter, loses its rhythm. Motivation melts, attention bursts. Serotonin, which calms down, is no longer coming in sufficient quantities. Trust, neuroscientists say, is the foundation of strategic thinking under pressure. When it is absent, the prefrontal cortex works less, and the amygdala (fear center) takes over. The result is a society that reacts impulsively, does not plan, does not build.
And that is perhaps the greatest danger: loss of trust not only destroys relationships, but pushes us into a lifestyle where we are constantly on alert, in "fight or flight" mode. And in that mode, there are no long-term projects, no big bridges, no lasting art. Only short, jerky reactions to the next impact.
That is why the story of trust in institutions is a story about our body and nerves. On how social capital can reduce cortisol levels just as well as good therapy. About how a closed, poorly calibrated network can lead us into a collective dead end.
Putnam, Kawachi, Paxton, Giddens: they all talk about the same phenomenon, just from different angles. Trust is a social glue, a psychological shield, a neurobiological regulator. When it disappears, the structure falls apart, the sense of meaning breaks, biochemistry is disrupted.
And then, when we try to live without him, we realize that trust is not naivety, but a way of survival. Without it, both institutions and bodies begin to fail. And then, perhaps, we realize that every reform, every change, every policy that ignores this invisible network, builds on sand.
The end of trust, the end of breathing.
It is no longer a "do you believe" question. That's the question: how much do you need to burst from the pain. How long does it take you to, while standing in line at the health center, realize that those who passed before you did not pass because they were better or sicker, but because they knew who to call. How much do you need to understand that what people call "rules" are not even rules, but decor, make-up on a broken drama.
Pickett and Wilkinson have written it before: inequality eats away at your confidence. Not because you are paranoid, but because you see: same disease, same day, same order, but one goes home with medicine, the other goes home to wait for death. Inequality goes down your spine like a chill, so you start looking over everyone's shoulder. And it's not your phobia anymore. It is a social diagnosis. Elstad tells you: who is down, dies more. Not in metaphor, but in statistics.
Rothstein adds salt to the wound: corruption not only takes money, it takes trust. When you realize that the doctor doesn't accept bribes out of a whim but from the system, that the clerk doesn't tighten the paper because he hates you but because he has to lubricate the chain, you also realize that in that chain you are not a link, you are a burden. And that trust, the fragile one, the one on which your heart and stomach depend, no longer exists.
And then the media gets involved. Digital hallucinations. You open your phone and see the world divided into two: black and white, yours and theirs, "us" and "them". Everyone is screaming from their echo chambers, everyone is lying, and the lie is packaged as "urgent" and "exclusive".
Social media takes your attention out of your hands, injects you with dopamine, and leaves you empty. FOMO (fear of missing something), selfies, filters, "highlight reel": everything that proves to you that you are smaller, worse, slower, uglier. And as you scroll, trust melts: first in institutions, then in neighbors, then in relatives, then in yourself.
Close to zero
Then, when that trust drops to zero, a new biology begins. Cortisol does not go down. Dopamine doesn't know when to call. Serotonin forget your number. It is a body that no longer believes. And there is no "mental health" in the traditional sense — there is only constant alertness, like an animal that has seen too many traps.
Putnam would tell you: without social capital, you can't even make a protest properly. Warren would add: democracy needs a healthy mistrust, but you don't have a healthy one anymore, you only have bitterness, a cynical mistrust that doesn't build anything. And Graham would nod: you get used to it. You adapt. You live in a bad balance and call it normal.
That's the worst point: when you stop expecting anything. When the institutions owe you nothing, and you owe them even less. When you get used to being lied to, stolen from, left waiting. And when it stops annoying you.
Because then, trust isn't even dead — it's rotten. And rot doesn't hurt, it just stinks.
And so, when I returned to the Postal Savings Bank in the afternoon to somehow retrieve the copies of the contracts I had signed, I felt like I was doing my own, small version of civic activism. Eventually I got them — not because it was a procedure, but because I was persistent enough.
But as I carried them home, holding them like a war trophy that no one else could see, the whole scene made my father sick. And perhaps that is the most accurate picture: documents in hand, but trust, long ago in intensive care.
The author is a psychologist
