Conference Agenda

“Airbnb is a business fueled by trust” (Airbnb, 2019). The peer-to-peer accommodation platform that disrupted the hospitality industry since 2008 has made a point time and again to tell the public and their customers how their business is built on trust and how they work actively to build trust among users (Airbnb, 2017, 2025). Public media and academic discourse have followed suit, with articles, blog posts, TED talks, podcasts, books and hundreds of academic articles on the specific topic of trust on Airbnb (Scopus, 2025).

In this study, Airbnb is used as a paradigmatic case of digital mediation of trust between strangers, which involves both online and offline experience of trust. I adopt a panoramic view of trust to understand what trust relations are involved in the functioning of the platform, and how they are mediated by digital technologies. The panoramic view of trust identifies four trust relations: interpersonal trust, institutional trust, self-trust and trust in technology (Pedersen, 2010, 2024). The theory posits that trust relations unfold on two levels: a habitual and a reflexive level and that trust and distrust are not mutually exclusive but exist on a continuum (Pedersen, 2010).

In my research, I offer an empirical investigation of trust on Airbnb to show how different trust relations are involved in the use of online platforms. The digitally enhanced environment works as a relatively new context that has developed over the last four decades (Domenicucci, 2018). Being able to study the evolution of this digital enhancement reveals the time dimension of the two-level theory of trust, where habitual trust is created over time through reflexive trust. The analysis further shows that trust relations expand online and through digital mediation trust is never just between people, but it emerges in an assemblage of people, institutions and technologies (DeLanda, 2006). This leads to question whether interpersonal trust between strangers can be mediated at all, and even more so if it can be “built” between strangers through the online platform.

While on one hand it appears that different relations are not discrete and mutually exclusive but coexist in the same experience, on the other hand, an analysis of the sociotechnical devices used to mediate trust relations on Airbnb reveals how trust and distrust are also fundamentally complementary in the process of digital mediation (Pumputis, 2024). Technical tools like verification systems, predictive and verification algorithms, online profile pages, “badges”, reviews, can only go as far as removing reasons for distrust and only indirectly help create trust as a result. The technical mediation by the platform does not directly build trust between strangers but by mediating institutional trust, self-trust and trust in technology, it can create a space where the possibility of interpersonal trust emerges. On the other hand, a discourse of trust is the main tool used to directly build trust, for example through marketing, policies, community standards and general communication (Pumputis & Mieli, 2024).

Airbnb. (2017). Perfect strangers: How Airbnb is building trust between hosts and guests. Airbnb Newsroom. Retrieved January 14, 2025, from https://news.airbnb.com/perfect-strangers-how-airbnb-is-building-trust-between-hosts-and-guests/

Airbnb. (2019). In the business of trust. Airbnb Newsroom. Retrieved January 14, 2025, from https://news.airbnb.com/in-the-business-of-trust/

Airbnb. (2025). How do I create an Airbnb account? Airbnb Help Center. Retrieved January 14, 2025, from https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/4

De Landa, M. (2006). A new philosophy of society: Assemblage theory and social complexity. London: Continuum.

Domenicucci, J. (2018). Trust, Extended Memories and Social Media. Towards a Philosophy of Digital Media, 119-142.

Pedersen, E. O. (2010). A Two-Level Theory of Trust. Balkan Journal of Philosophy, 2(1), 47-56.

Pedersen, E. O. (2024). A Panoramic View of Trust in the Time of Digital Automated Decision Making – Failings of Trust in the Post Office and the Tax Authorities. Sats (Aarhus), 25(1), 29–47. https://doi.org/10.1515/sats-2024-0008

Pumputis, A. (2024). Trust and control on peer-to-peer platforms : A sociomaterial analysis of guest-host relationships in digital environments. Lund University.

Pumputis, A., & Mieli, M. (2024). From trust to trustworthiness: Formalising consumer behaviour with discourse on Airbnb platform. In Consumer Behaviour in Hospitality and Tourism (pp. 83-102). Routledge.

Scopus. (2025). Search query: [airbnb AND trust]. Retrieved [14 january 2025], from https://www.scopus.com