 In support of this picture utilitarians argue that promises are the sorts of things which are generally made because the promisee wants the thing promised, and so wants to be assured of getting it. Since a promise is designed to secure his trust, and that trust is then likely to be the source of much pain if it’s disappointed, it’s reasonable to assume that in most cases keeping one’s promise will be productive of better consequences than breaking them, given the expectations of the promisee. And there are other potential negative consequences of breaking a promise (e.g., the loss of trust by one’s familiars, the general erosion of trust in the practice of promises) that utilitarians can add to the negative side of the ledger. For an astute philosophical survey of Act Utilitarian approaches to promising see Atiyah (1981: 30–79), also Robins (1984: 140–143) and Vitek (1993: 61–70).