Procedural Fairness as a Buffer and Resource against Undesirable Information

Perceptions of procedural fairness refers to the extent to which procedures used in organisational decision-making are seen as fair. These perceptions influence not only how organisational members feel and think about their managers and the organisation, but also how they behave toward them.
The objective of the proposed research is to find out why procedural fairness is so relevant to organizational members. The proposed research maintains that procedural fairness has direct implications for the self. In particular, perceptions of fairness serve two specific self-functions. First, they calibrate or buffer the self against subsequent negative events. These events, regardless of whether they occur in an organisational setting or not, have personally aversive consequences. Second, perceptions of procedural fairness resource the self. That is, following a personally undesirable event, procedural fairness repairs the psychological damage done by bolstering the self-system.
Nine experiments, both internet and laboratory, will test the hypothesised buffer and resource functions of procedural fairness. The findings will be relevant not only to researchers in this popular area but also to organisational and educational settings.