25.9.2025 Khadijah Kainat
This summer I had the privilege of attending The Migration Conference 2025 (TMC 2025) in London, held from 11 to 17 June. The gathering brought together migration scholars, policymakers, and community practitioners from around the world. Among its many insightful panels, one overarching theme that deeply resonated with me was the dynamic interplay of trust and information in the migration context.
Trust and Information in the Migration Journey
A recurrent thread in the discussions was that trust is relational and deeply social, not just a static concept. We explored how migrants often rely on informal networks such as family, community members, or social media to access vital information prior to or during their migration journeys. However, the reliability of this information is not guaranteed, and misinformation can greatly undermine decision-making and safety. This aligns with findings from a systematic review highlighting that trust among refugees is shaped across different stages, flight, transit, and resettlement and is both relational and contextual (Sundbäck, 2023).
Another compelling insight came from sessions discussing migrants’ trust in institutions. Illustrating this, a large-scale Swedish study revealed that migrants’ trust in institutions depends both on prior norms from their country of origin and their direct experiences with host-country institutional performance (Journal of International Migration and Integration, 2024). In other words, both ingrained cultural expectations and real institutional interactions play key roles in building, or eroding, trust.
This duality struck me as profoundly important: information, when trusted, empowers – but when untrusted, it isolates. Whether it’s navigating legal processes, accessing health or social services, or simply finding one’s place in a new society, trust acts as the bridge between information and engagement.
In many conference discussions, participants also emphasized how the quality of information shapes the overall trust-building process. Migrants often encounter contradictory guidance from different authorities, NGOs, and community sources, which creates uncertainty and confusion. When this happens, they tend to fall back on familiar and accessible sources, even if these are not always reliable. Another point raised was the role of digital platforms: social media can provide rapid access to practical advice, but at the same time, it can amplify rumors and unverified stories. Several panelists noted that the speed of information circulation does not necessarily equal accuracy, and that the emotional tone of online content can strongly influence migrants’ perceptions of risk and opportunity. These discussions highlighted how trust is not only about who provides information, but also about the context in which it is received, the emotions it triggers, and the perceived consequences of acting on it.
Connecting Insights to My Research
These reflections also resonate with my own research path. In my doctoral dissertation, I explored the information seeking behavior of migrant women during the integration process. My findings highlighted how trust in information from their own communities played a decisive role in shaping their strategies of adaptation and decision-making (Kainat, 2025). This personal academic background gave me a strong lens for engaging with the discussions at TMC 2025, where I could see how similar trust dynamics surface in different migration contexts.
Beyond academic findings, the discussions at TMC 2025 also made me think about the human side of trust in everyday encounters. For migrants, the decision to trust a piece of information is rarely only rational; it is often tied to feelings of vulnerability, uncertainty, and belonging. In moments of transition, trust can be shaped by a single supportive conversation, a reassuring gesture from an institution, or the comfort of hearing familiar language. These small but powerful dynamics show that trust is not built overnight, but is constantly negotiated in everyday life. Recognizing this complexity is crucial not only for researchers but also for policymakers who wish to design inclusive integration measures that genuinely resonate with people’s lived experiences.
In my current postdoctoral work within the Mobile Futures project, I continue to examine these themes through a survey that investigates the relationship between trust and information. This work builds directly on both my earlier findings and the rich discussions at TMC 2025, while extending them into new methodological directions. Attending the conference therefore not only deepened my understanding of these issues but also offered comparative insights that will strengthen my ongoing research.
Moving Forward
Ultimately, attending TMC 2025 reinforced my belief that understanding how trust and information intersect in migration is not only academically compelling but also deeply practical. Crafting policies, digital tools, and community programs that foster both reliable information flows and institutional credibility must remain at the center of efforts to support migrants effectively.
References
- Sundbäck, L. (2023). Trust Shaping in Forced Migrants’ Institutional Encounters in the Finnish Welfare State. Nordic Journal of Migration Research, 13(2), Article 7.
- Kainat, K. (2025). Navigating New Horizons of Socio-Cultural Transition: Information seeking behavior of migrant women in the context of integration.
- Journal of International Migration and Integration. (2024). Migrants’ Trust in the Swedish Migration Agency: Exploring Influencing Factors Through Large-Scale Survey Data.
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