China's traditional culture attaches great importance to the principle of honesty and believes that honesty can generate great inspiration. Mencius said: "Honesty is the way of heaven, honesty is the way of people;" Those who are sincere and motionless are not there; If you are dishonest, there will be no porters. "It means that the sky really doesn't deceive people, and one should also think about honesty and don't deceive people. Sincerity can impress people, but dishonesty can't. Confucius said that "people can't stand without faith" and Xunzi also said that "people can't stand without sincerity", and they all regard honesty as a force to educate and influence people. Confucius regards honesty as the foundation of being a man. He suggested that friends should "keep their words" and said that "people without faith don't know what they can do." "It means that if a person doesn't keep his word, he doesn't know how to live in the world.

In the formation and development of interpersonal relationships, it is very important whether people follow the principle of good faith. One of the important figures who formally put this problem into the category of human science is psychologist Norman? Anderson. He once listed 555 adjectives describing people's personality characteristics, asking college students to point out which personality characteristics they like best. The results show that the highest evaluation quality of college students is sincerity, and the lowest is lying and hypocrisy. Sincere and trustworthy personality leads to interpersonal attraction, which is conducive to the establishment, maintenance and development of good interpersonal relationships. However, selfish, hypocritical and treacherous personality traits hinder interpersonal attraction and are difficult to win people's trust, which is very unfavorable to the establishment and harmony of interpersonal relationships.

No matter what economic times, honesty is the basis of dealing with interpersonal relationships. In the era of agricultural economy, it is a kind of rural social integrity. Borrow money to grow grain, make friends and get married, be honest, borrow without paying back, which is well known in the whole village and does not trade; "It is easy to borrow, but it is not difficult to borrow again"; It's notorious that cheating friends ruined marriage and stopped dating. Loyalty and honesty, abiding by credit, have become the basic requirements for coordinating interpersonal relationships.