The Separation Of The Dual Structure Of Fairness Of Faith In The Decision Of Altruistic Punishment

Belief in a just world is a double-edged sword, thanks to the different structures, belief in a just world exhibits some kinds of functions. Unjust situation poses a threat to the belief in a just world, triggering defense responses. Belief in a just world for the self and belief for the others are one kind of two-dimension structures of this conception, which exhibit different functions. Altruistic punishment is a costly and altruistic behavior which means the cost of self-interest and the punishment of injustice. The decision-making was based on the perception and the judgment of the justice. Because the decision cost people’s interest, we should consider the cost would or would not be compensated. The bi-dimensional structure of just world belief provided the explanation to the behavior results.This essay consisted of three main parts, the first research used questionnaire method to find the correlation between the just world belief and the decision of altruistic punishment, moreover, there is a test about the effect of the specific situation when people made the decision; then analyzed preliminarily the contribution of personal BJW (short for the personal just world belief) and general BJW (short for the general just world belief) to the correlation between the above two variables. The second research used the third-punishment game to testify the result of research one, and further investigated the function of the personal BJW and general BJW. The results showed that people whose personal BJW was higher than general BJW made more punishment decision. The third research used the ultimatum game to eliminate the altruistic motive, designed to compare with the result of the second research and found the influence of the altruistic motivation.Compared and synthesized the results of the three researches, this essay worked out the following conclusions:First, belief in a just world would influence the perception of the severity of injustice. Compared to the one whose belief in a just world was lower, the higher ones had a worse perception of the severity of injustice.Second, the severity of the injustice would influence people’s altruistic punishment. Only serious situation made an effective threat to personal-BJW and lead to the defensive behavior. Thanks to the belief, people can accept a certain extent of the injustice, especially when the defensive behavior would cost our own price. However, when the injustice became more serious to cross some critical point, people would punish the injustice to protect the justice no matter how much they would pay for.Third, people whose personal belief in a just world was higher than the general belief focused on the altruistic punishment when the altruistic motivation was activated, but this altruism occurred only when the injustice was very serious. These people paid more attention on the social desirability effect of the altruism, and when the personal belief was higher, the tendency to help others was higher too.Last, people whose general belief in a just world was higher than the personal belief showed a lower intention to the altruistic punishment. The general belief higher preferred to protect the justice, but wasn’t willing to help others. The justice preference would be showed up only when the injustice was serious, and when the victim was himself other than the others.