Less Fairness, More Prosocial Intention and Behavior? Procedural Fairness, Cohesion, and Prosocial and Trust Outcomes: An Assessment of Mediation and Interaction

Abstract

A group reward account has identified procedural fairness as related to increases in better attitudes towards authority and prosocial behavior, through group cohesion (Blader & Tyler, 2009; Tyler & Blader, 2003). Conversely, a group repair account has experimentally demonstrated that procedural unfairness spurs group-serving prosocial behavior (Barry & Tyler, 2009, 2010). To adjudicate between these two accounts, the present research examined how low, compared to high, procedural fairness is related to trust in national authorities and prosocial intention and behavior, via cohesion. A unique survey of 3,416 residents in Lebanon fielded immediately after the 2020 Beirut blast was used. Predictions for prosocial outcomes were based on the group repair account, and predictions for trust outcomes were based on the group reward account. Specifically, I predicted that perceiving low procedural fairness from authority and, in relation, low group cohesion, would correspond with low trust in authority but, ironically, prosocial intention and behavior towards others affected by the blast. I argue that this may have been the case based on shortcomings of authority presumably perceived in the context of the blast. Additionally, I considered the argument that people especially sensitive to procedural unfairness would disengage from the national group but still assert the worth of the self (Sleebos et al., 2006). Accordingly, I predicted that the magnitude of the indirect relationship between procedural fairness and prosocial outcomes would be larger, and the magnitude of the indirect relationship between procedural fairness and trust in authority would be lower, for participants low (vs. high) on procedural fairness.

In the present work, I demonstrate that perceiving more procedural unfairness of authority was related to prosocial intention and prosocial behavior through seeing that the country was not united—and this was not the case when procedural fairness of authority was perceived. The indirect relationship between procedural fairness and trust, via cohesion, in an allegedly independent government agency, the Council for Development and Reconstruction, was demonstrated, though it did not differ by levels of procedural fairness. There was a direct relationship between procedural fairness and trust in political parties, but not an indirect one through cohesion. Results are discussed in the context of the sectarian political system in Lebanon, and in terms of contributions to the group repair and group reward accounts of procedural (un)fairness. Limitations and future directions are addressed.