在中國人的信任問題研究上目前主要存在兩種思路：一種將其納入人際與制度信任或普遍與特殊信任等西方社會科學二元範式中加以分析；另一種則將其與中國人的「關係」相連，討論關係信任的內在結構與運作過程。前者印證了西方理念類型的普世效力，卻抽空了中國社會的經驗基礎；後者證明了中國人信任模式的特殊性和西方信任理論的局限性，卻在深層邏輯上依然受制於前者。本研究另闢蹊徑，提出一個時空二維的關係信任分析框架，利用數據資料和日常經驗深入分析中國人的關係信任中所包含的放心信任、可靠信任、保證信任與高險信任四個區域，指出其具體運行過程中存在類別化與關係化的雙重機制。研究者認為，關係信任在不同情境及其變換過程中具有極其複雜的實踐邏輯。它既受到關係及其承載的「情—面—權」機制的擴展鞏固，自身又不斷製造形實分離並最終產生形式主義的內在危機。最後，研究者對此框架進行提煉，借此重新定位並且比較澄清了既有中西信任研究中的關鍵局限，指出中國人信任問題的研究重心與可能路徑。

There are two routes in Chinese people’s trust problem research. One puts it into the western dualistic paradigm, another connects it to Chinese’s guanxi. But I choose the third way. Based on a general relation-trust analysis framework with a time-space dimension and with some other survey data and daily experience, I argue that the trust structure of Chinese people can be divided into four significant zones: easy trust, reliable trust, assurance trust and high-risk trust. The zones of relation-trust entail categorization mechanism and correlative mechanism under different running processes. Relation-trust presents an extremely complex logic of practice because it varies with the time and place. It not only can be expanded and strengthened through guanxi, renqing (favor or personal obligation), mianzi (face), and power, but also leads to the separation of the form and reality of itself. It tends to give rise to a formalism crisis. Finally, I refine the relation-trust framework, position, compare and clarify the core limitations of the western and indigenous trust researches, then point out the key goal and possible paths for future research into Chinese people’s trust.