Following Eleanor Singer’s calling for more theory, the paper examines the applicability of recent advances in trust theory to survey incentive usage and the general downward trend of survey response. Current approaches to survey (non)response and incentives employ the obsolete Social Exchange Theory trust notion. An overview of the major trust concepts shows that such incentive strategies distrust and manipulate the respondents, behavioural practices included. These may trigger reactance, alienation, and subjective isolation. Consequently, incentive strategies should be shifted from ‘trust-provoking’ designs to making distrust irrelevant in the response situation and enabling respondents’ trust by showing genuine trust towards them.