When do we need procedural fairness? The role of trust in authority

On the basis of fairness heuristic theory, the authors argue that when info rmation about whether an authority can be trusted is not available, people will resolve the question of how they should interpret the decisions of the authority by relying on perceived procedural fairness. As a consequence, p eople who do not have information about authority's trustworthiness react m ore positively toward the outcomes of authority's decisions if the authorit y is using fair as opposed to unfair procedures. However, when people know that the authority either can or cannot be trusted, they are less in need o f procedural fairness information, yielding less strong effects of procedur al fairness on people's reactions. The findings of 2 experiments support th e authors' line of reasoning. It is concluded that people especially need p rocedural,fairness when information about an authority's trustworthiness is lacking.