Ease-of-Retrieval Effects On Procedural Justice Judgments Under Conditions Of Informational And Personal Uncertainty

A growing body of research has shown that, in addition to the features of the procedure (also called content information), an important source of information is ease-of-retrieval. These leads to an important question: Under what conditions do people rely on accessibility experiences to form procedural justice judgments? The most studying moderator is uncertainty, here are two noteworthy types of uncertainties: personal uncertainty and informational uncertainty. Previous research on potential moderators of ease-of-retrieval reliance focused on self uncertainty only, which neglecting another potentially important moderator-informational uncertainty. In the present research, we investigate whether reliance on accessibility experiences is particularly pronounced under conditions of informational uncertainty. Furthermore, the joint effect of self uncertainty and informational uncertainty on reliance on ease-of-retrieval is studied as well. We conducted three experiments to investigate these issues:Experiment1is a2(procedure: implicit-no-voice procedure VS. explicit-no-voice procedure) x2(number of aspects: few VS. many) between-subjects design.80Chinese students participated in this experiment voluntarily. A two-way ANOVA showed that the interaction between procedure and number of unfair aspects was significant, participants in the implicit-no-voice condition rated the procedure as less just after retrieving few rather than many unfair aspects. We assumed this to reflect reliance on ease-of-retrieval under conditions of informational uncertainty. In contrast, participants in the explicit-no-voice condition, rated the procedure as more just after retrieving few rather than many unfair aspects. Presumably, this reflected reliance on content information under conditions of informational certainty.Experiment2is a a2(procedure:implicit-no-voice procedure VS. explicit-no-voice procedure) x2(salience: self uncertainty salient VS. self certainty salient) x2(number of aspects: few VS. many) between-subjects design.144Chinese students participated in this experiment. A three-way ANOVA showed that the interaction between procedure and state personal uncertainty and number of aspects was significant. The results revealed that in the explicit-no-voice condition, participants in the personal uncertainty salience condition evaluated the procedure as more just after retrieving few rather than many aspects. Presumably, this reflected reliance on content information. In contrast, participants in the personal certainty salience condition, rated the procedure as more unjust after retrieving few rather than many aspects;Experiments3is a2(procedure:implicit-no-voice procedure VS.explicit-no-voice procedure) x2(number of aspects:few VS. many) between-subjects design.147Chinese students participated in this experiment, hierarchical regression analysis showed that the interaction between procedure and state personal uncertainty and number of aspects was not significant. This experiment did not support the hypothesis that in the explicit-no-voice condition, dispositional self uncertain participants evaluated the procedure to be more just after retrieving few rather than many aspects.The discussion explains how these findings are in accordance with our integrative perspective on the work on judgments under informational uncertainty and the literature on self uncertainty. The inconsistency of the result were also discussed. This paper also indicated that further research can develop this topic by extending moderators, context and paradigms.