Rejection Exaggerates Egocentric Perception of Fairness in Resource Allocation
28 Pages Posted: 11 Nov 2008
Date Written: November 9, 2008
Abstract
The present research tests the idea that rejection may exaggerate the egocentric perception of fairness. Rejection was induced by social exclusion. Participants then received monetary compensation for enduring dissonant noise, and another manipulation involved the amount of noise. In the self-suffered-more condition, participants were told that they had endured more noise than the other person. In the partner-suffered-more condition, participants endured less noise than the other person. All participants were asked to distribute a monetary compensation fairly between themselves and an anonymous individual external to their group. The results showed that the rejected participants kept more money as their fair compensation than the accepted participants when they encountered the prospect of receiving less payment than their partner.
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