When do others matter? The impact of dyadic social relationships on fairness judgments

Abstract

This dissertation reports two studies that examine the influence of social context factors in the formation of individuals’ fairness judgments about their organization. In the first study, I investigated the extent to which individuals are susceptible to social influences from others in forming justice judgments. Examining this in terms of congruence in perceptions of justice between two individuals at the dyad level, I found that individuals are influenced by certain specific members of their immediate social networks more than others. Using a sample in an Indian bank, I found that individuals had perceptions about their organization that were similar to others who were central in the expressive and instrumental networks, as well as those who occupied structurally similar positions in the network as themselves. I also found that negative ties and negative network characteristics were negatively related to similarity in perceptions. Such dyad level influence processes, when aggregated at the group level, could lead to contagion in perceptions about the organization. In the second study, I studied how people react to (in)equity issues in specific resource allocation situations based on relational considerations. 196 employees in a small Indian bank provided responses to a work related vignette/scenario study. I found that people tended to perceive reward situations as more fair, even when they received an unfavorable outcome, if a positively related comparison other received a better outcome. On the other hand, I also found that individuals were more critical in their fairness judgments when they received an unfavorable outcome when the comparison other was negatively related. Positive and negative emotions mediated this relationship. Practical implications and directions for future research are discussed