Title

Framing effects in justice perceptions: Prospect theory and counterfactuals

Authors

Authors

D. B. Ganegoda;R. Folger

Comments

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Abbreviated Journal Title

Organ. Behav. Hum. Decis. Process.

Keywords

Fairness theory; Prospect theory; Organizational justice; Counterfactuals; ORGANIZATIONAL JUSTICE; SOCIAL-EXCHANGE; DECISIONS; PSYCHOLOGY; JUDGMENT; RISK; METAANALYSIS; RATIONALITY; MILLENNIUM; INDUSTRIAL; Psychology, Applied; Management; Psychology, Social

Abstract

The majority of organizational justice research is underscored by the assumption that individuals form justice perceptions based on deliberate processing of information, using various justice judgment criteria. Taking an alternative view, this research examined how individuals form fairness perceptions in less deliberate ways-in particular, based on the way in which a decision outcome is framed. Drawing on prospect theory (Kahneman & Tversky, 1979), we argued that decision outcomes that are framed in line with prospect theory's predictions would attenuate counterfactual processing because those outcomes are consistent with individuals' biased preferences. Drawing on fairness theory (Folger & Cropanzano, 1998, 2001), we argued that lower levels of counterfactual thinking increases the tendency for a decision to seem fair; therefore, framing a decision in a way that is consistent with a pre-existing bias could increase the extent to which it is perceived as fair. We found support for our hypotheses in two experiments. (C) 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Journal Title

Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes

Volume

126

Publication Date

1-1-2015

Document Type

Article

Language

English

First Page

27

Last Page

36

WOS Identifier

WOS:000348555300003

ISSN

0749-5978

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