Tolerance of Justice Violations: The Effects of Need on Emotional Reactions After Violating Equality in Social Dilemmas1

Equality is an important coordination rule in social dilemmas. Studies have shown that a violation of equality elicits strong negative emotions. This research addresses whether these emotional reactions occur when another group member is in need of social support. Results showed that participants reacted less negatively if equality was violated and the other person was in need. Moreover, it was shown that there are individual differences in the extent to which people are influenced by fairness violations in their emotional reactions. In particular, Conscientiousness was important for people's emotional reactions, and people low rather than high in Conscientiousness reacted more negatively. These findings are discussed in light of coordination rules and emotions in social dilemmas and individual differences.     

Challenging the Leader or the Follower: Influence of Need for Emotion and Equality Violations on Emotional and Retributive Reactions in Social Dilemmas1

Research has shown that if equality is violated in public‐good dilemmas, group members react with more anger if another group member (a follower), rather than if the leader violates equality. The present research argued that people's personality—particularly, need for emotion—moderates group members’ reactions if equality is violated by either the leader or a follower. Results revealed that group members low in need for emotion reacted with more anger and were more inclined to exclude the violator if this person was a follower, rather than the leader of the group. Group members high in need for emotion, however, reacted with more anger and wished to exclude the violator more if this person was the leader, rather than a follower.     

True versus strategic fairness in a common resource dilemma: Evidence from the dual‐process perspective

Common resource dilemmas involve collectively coordinating individual choices to promote group efficiency. Equal division represents one of the most important coordination rules. Previous research suggests that individuals follow the equality rule for different reasons. Some individuals behave cooperatively out of their concern for other's welfare, whereas some individuals cooperate strategically to enhance personal gains. Building on the dual‐process perspective, the authors aim to differentiate strategic fairness from true fairness in solving a resource dilemma. In four experiments, the effect of cognitive processing manipulations on individual harvesting behavior in a one‐shot resource dilemma was tested against participants with different social values. Results consistently showed that prosocials, who value joint outcome and equality, requested significantly less money than did proselfs, who value personal gain. More importantly, prosocials in the intuition and deliberation conditions request similar amounts, whereas proselfs in the intuition condition request more money than those in the deliberation condition. The results were further validated by a follow‐up meta‐analysis based on the four experiments. The implications of the dual‐process perspective for social coordination research are discussed.     

Why inconsistent leadership is regarded as procedurally unfair: the importance of social self‐esteem concerns

Three experimental studies examined to what extent leader's consistent use of procedures constitutes an important procedural fairness rule and influences people's reactions as a function of social self‐esteem. In line with a recent claim that more attention should be devoted to different procedural fairness rules (Brockner, Ackerman, & Fairchild, 2001 ), the findings of Study 1 demonstrated that inconsistent leaders were evaluated as less procedurally fair and influenced feelings of uncertainty about oneself in ongoing interpersonal interactions. Study 2 showed that manipulating leader's consistency influenced people's procedural fairness judgments and willingness to replace the leader, but only among those low in social self‐esteem (SSE). Finally, Study 3, using another consistency manipulation, demonstrated that variations in consistency made participants feel bad about themselves, particularly when they were low in SSE. These findings are discussed in light of research on relational models of justice and sociometer theory. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Hearing about a story character's negative emotional reaction to having been dishonest causes young children to cheat less

There is extensive research on the development of cheating in early childhood but research on how to reduce it is rare. The present preregistered study examined whether telling young children about a story character's emotional reactions towards cheating could significantly reduce their tendency to cheat (N = 400; 199 boys; Age: 3–6 years). Results showed that telling older kindergarten children about the story character's negative emotional reaction towards rule violation significantly reduced cheating, but telling them about the positive emotional reaction towards rule adherence did not. These results show that children as young as age 5 are able to use information about another child's emotional reaction to guide their own moral behavior. In particular, highlighting another child's negative emotional reaction towards a moral transgression may be an effective way to reduce cheating in early childhood. This finding, along with earlier cheating reduction findings, suggests that although cheating is common in early childhood, simple methods can reduce its occurrence.     

UNIVERSALISM IN LAY CONCEPTIONS OF DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE: A CROSS-CULTURAL EXAMINATION

In two studies of Japanese and Australian university students, we examined the resource allocation rules of equity and equality. In both cultures, subjects were universalistic rather than relativistic in their judgments of fairness and alterability of these rules in the work place. They judged the equity rule to be unalterable by legislation or consensus. However, in both studies, the Japanese perceived equity to be less fair and equality to be less unfair than their Australian counterparts. In addition, study 2 indicated that cross-cultural differences in judgments of fairness were influenced by consideration of need. The age of the worker was a more important determinant of fairness judgments for Japanese than for Australians; the debt of a worker was a more important déterminant for Australians than for Japanese. The results are discussed with regard to the role of culture in conceptions of distributive justice.     

Exploring how people respond to conflicts between self‐interest and fairness: Influence of threats to the self on affective reactions to advantageous inequity

Two studies examined how people deal with conflicts between their self‐interest concerns and their striving for fairness. Specifically, the affective reactions to outcome arrangements in which people receive better outcomes than comparable other persons, were studied. These arrangements of advantageous inequity constitute situations in which fairness and self‐interest concerns are in conflict. Building on the social psychology of the self, it was predicted, and found, in both field and lab experiments that when people experience a self‐threat, they react more positively to arrangements of advantageous inequity than when not experiencing this threat. This supports the view that people's need for positive information about their selves is an important factor in the underlying psychological processes of the way that people deal with conflicts between their fairness and self‐interest concerns.     

A Multi-Cultural Study of Salespeople's Behavior In Individual Pay-For-Performance Compensation Systems: When Managers Are More Equal And Less Fair Than Others

In this research, we examine salespeople's behavior in individual pay-for-performance compensation systems and show how perceived management fairness seems to energize sales employees in some environments but not in others. We use a large multicountry database of individual-level remuneration for more than 2,500 salespeople across four B2B industry sectors to demonstrate cultural adaptations of the effect of perceived management fairness. The results indicate that top management should be concerned with employees' perceptions of fairness in addition to the more typical concerns of control and motivation widely acknowledged in the microeconomics-based sales-force compensation literature. In particular, we show that perceptions of management fairness are key to salespeople's proportion of total pay generated by pay-for-performance formulas.     

Why Do Members of Disadvantaged Groups Strike Back at Perceived Negativity Towards the In‐group?

Against the background of riots in communities across London in 2011, this paper examines the implications of negative meta‐stereotypes on stigmatized group members' reactions towards members of privileged out‐groups within their communities. We hypothesized that concerns over negative opinions that the dominant out‐group is expected to hold of the in‐group (i.e. meta‐stereotypes) would be negatively associated with group members' perceptions of societal fairness and that this relationship would be mediated by members' recall of personal experiences with discrimination. We further hypothesized that views about societal fairness that are challenged in this way would lower an inclination to express discontent with the status quo via normative means while at the same time, increase nonnormative expressions. Results from two surveys (study 1, N = 50; study 2, N = 132) provided support for these hypotheses and are discussed in terms of their meaning for community relations. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Effects of Perceived Responsibility,Injury Severity,and Injury Target on Discipline Severity

We examined the effects of injury severity, injury target, and perceived responsibility on supervisors' discipline severity following a rule violation. Participants made discipline judgments after reading scenarios describing work rule violations. Data revealed an Injury Severity × Injury Target interactive effect on discipline severity. Respondents disciplined rule violators more severely when the behavior caused a serious coworker injury than when the violating behavior caused a minor coworker injury. Discipline severity decreased as the severity of the injury the rule violator experienced increased. That finding goes against conventional wisdom stating that a positive linear relation exists between the extent of an injury and discipline severity and suggests that supervisors might not make all discipline judgments in a simple, linear fashion.     

Violating equality in social dilemmas: emotional and retributive reactions as a function of trust, attribution, and honesty

In social dilemmas, equality is an important coordination rule. When equality is violated, people seek explanations. In Experiment 1, the authors assessed dispositional trust and found that especially high trusters were affected by the given explanation. High trusters reacted less negatively to external than internal explanations. Experiment 2, using a manipulation of trust in others, revealed a similar pattern across a wider range of negative emotions. In Experiment 3, the authors only induced high trust and showed that when the external explanation turned out to be a lie, emotional and retributive reactions became more negative. Moreover, attribution information did not influence reactions when participants realized that the information was dishonest.     

Further evaluating the conditional decision rule for comparing two independent means

Many books on statistical methods advocate a ‘conditional decision rule’ when comparing two independent group means. This rule states that the decision as to whether to use a ‘pooled variance’ test that assumes equality of variance or a ‘separate variance’ Welch t test that does not should be based on the outcome of a variance equality test. In this paper, we empirically examine the Type I error rate of the conditional decision rule using four variance equality tests and compare this error rate to the unconditional use of either of the t tests (i.e. irrespective of the outcome of a variance homogeneity test) as well as several resampling‐based alternatives when sampling from 49 distributions varying in skewness and kurtosis. Several unconditional tests including the separate variance test performed as well as or better than the conditional decision rule across situations. These results extend and generalize the findings of previous researchers who have argued that the conditional decision rule should be abandoned.     

Effects of Responsibility for Illness and Social Acceptability on Reactions to People With AIDS: A Cross-Cultural Comparison

In this research, we examined how responsibility for illness (defined as having taken or not taken health precautions prior to becoming ill) and the social acceptability of the situation in which one acquires a disease (defined as being a drug addict or a laboratory worker) affected how German and American students reacted to a person ill with AIDS. Reactions included respondents' emotional responses, their willingness to allocate resources, and their perceptions of the fairness or unfairness of the depicted individual's plight. Results indicated that respondents reacted more positively toward the other with AIDS, were willing to distribute more resources to him, and saw his plight as being more unfair when he was depicted as being less responsible for his illness and when he became HIV infected in a more socially acceptable manner. Respondents from Germany were consistently more positive in their reactions than respondents from the United States. Also, respondents from Germany took differences in the patient's social acceptability less into account in their reactions than did U.S. respondents. The results were interpreted in light of the different health-care structures utilized in the two cultures.     

理性-经验加工对不公正情绪和行为反应的影响:公正敏感性的调节作用

基于认知-经验理论,采用行为实验法和情境故事法,探讨了不同信息加工方式对不公正情绪和行为反应的影响,以及受害者敏感性对两者关系的调节作用。结果表明,与理性加工相比,经验加工下个体对不公正有更强烈的负性情绪反应,合作意向更低;受害者敏感性调节加工方式与不公正行为反应之间的关系,即受害者敏感性低时,加工方式与人际公正对合作意向交互作用显著,受害者敏感性高时,加工方式与人际公正对合作意向没有交互作用。     

Psychopolitics

Neophyte group therapy trainees often encounter significant difficulties in their initial experiences as group therapists. In this article, we report and discuss the results of a semistructured interview conducted with each of 16 neophyte group therapy trainees in an academic training program. The interview focused on the trainees' subjective experiences related to their initial training and group therapy clinical practice, with particular emphasis on their satisfaction with their training and the role and impact of supervision. All trainees reported strong emotional reactions to their group experience and numerous technical concerns. However, trainees reported a broad range of degrees of satisfaction with their training. Overall satisfaction with training strongly paralleled satisfaction with supervision and the supervisory relationship. Recommendations for improving the group therapy training experience that emerge from the evaluation of the trainees' subjective experiences are suggested.     

Experiments Behind the Veil: Structural Influences on Judgments of Social Justice

In two experiments, participants judged the fairness of different distributions of wealth in hypothetical societies. In the first study, the level of meritocracy in the hypothetical societies and the frame of reference from which participants judged alternative distributions of wealth interacted to influence fairness judgments. As meritocracy increased, all participants became more tolerant of economic inequality, particularly when they judged fairness from a redistribution frame of reference that made salient transfers among socioeconomic classes. Liberal participants, however, placed a greater emphasis on equality than did conservative participants across all conditions. In the second study, reactions to income transfers depended on the efficiency of the transfers and the identity of the groups receiving the benefits, but conservatives placed a greater emphasis in their fairness judgments on tying benefits to workfare requirements, whereas liberals did not distinguish between unconditional welfare transfers and workfare transfers.     

Collective guilt,moral outrage,and support for helping the poor: A matter of system versus in‐group responsibility framing

We examined how the framing of responsibility for reducing socio‐economic inequality affects individuals' emotional reactions towards the poor and the willingness to engage in prosocial actions. Attribution of responsibility to either the system (government and institutions), the less deprived in‐group, or the disadvantaged out‐group (poor) was measured (Study 1) and manipulated (Study 2). Consistent with our hypotheses, moral outrage was higher than collective guilt when system responsibility for inequalities was put forth, but collective guilt arose to reach the level of moral outrage when in‐group responsibility was emphasized. Moreover, distinguishing between collective guilt for action and for inaction, we found guilt for inaction more difficult and thus less likely to arise, unless responsibility was put on the in‐group. Collective emotions were also found to be negatively linked to system justification motivation illustrating the palliative function of legitimization processes. Finally, moral outrage predicted the willingness to act upon socio‐economic inequalities both when the system's and in‐group's responsibility was emphasized, whereas collective guilt for action (but not for inaction) predicted support for prosocial actions only when the in‐group's responsibility was engaged. These findings suggest that the specific group‐based emotions in response to poverty depend on whether the system or the in‐group is held responsible and differentially predict individuals' commitment to act.     

INFINITE REGRESS ARGUMENTS

Abstract

Gerald Cohen's critique of John Rawls's theory of justice is that it is concerned only with the justice of social institutions, and must thus arbitrarily draw a line between those inequalities excluded and those allowed by the basic structure. Cohen claims that a proper concern with the interests of the least advantaged would rule out ‘incentives’ for ‘talented’ individuals. I argue that Rawls's assumption that the subject of justice is the basic structure of society does not arbitrarily restrict the concerns of political justice, as Cohen claims. Further, I argue that it does not allow ‘deep’ inequalities within a just basic structure. When properly understood, Rawls's theory of justice is strongly egalitarian, taken as a theory of fairness in the way the burdens and benefits of social cooperation are distributed, even if it is not as egalitarian as Cohen wishes.     

Decategorization and the reduction of bias in the crossed categorization paradigm

Within the crossed categorization paradigm we examined the consequences of cooperative and personalized contact under conditions that promoted attention to unique attributes of team members (decategorization) versus conditions that emphasized their category memberships. As predicted, when the rule for composing teams emphasized one or both of the experimentally induced dimensions of category distinction, ethnocentric bias generalized to members of another team as a function of category similarity. When, instead, the rule emphasized team members' unique attributes, shared in‐group memberships no longer moderated bias towards members of another team. Instead, there was an equivalence pattern in the evaluative ratings of the four targets (in‐group/in‐group; in‐group/out‐group; out‐group/in‐group; out‐group/out‐group) of the crossed categorization paradigm. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Equality as Comparative Fairness

The goal of this article is modest. It is simply to help illuminate the nature of egalitarianism. More particularly, I aim to show what certain egalitarians are committed to, and to suggest that equality, as these egalitarians understand it, is an important normative ideal that cannot simply be ignored in moral deliberations. In doing this, I distinguish between equality as universality, equality as impartiality, and equality as comparability, and also between instrumental and non‐instrumental egalitarianism. I then characterise the version of egalitarianism with which I am concerned, which I call equality as comparative fairness. I discuss the relations between equality, fairness, luck, and responsibility, and defend egalitarianism against rival views that focus on subsistence, sufficiency, or compassion. I also defend egalitarianism against the Levelling Down and Raising Up Objections, and present several key examples to illustrate egalitarianism's distinct appeal, in contrast to prioritarianism's. I conclude by considering two common questions about my view: first, whether my ultimate concern is really with comparative fairness, rather than equality, so that my view is not, in fact, a substantive, non‐instrumental version of egalitarianism, and second, whether my view ultimately reduces to a theory about desert.