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A RELATIONAL MODEL
OF
AUTHORITY
IN GROUPS
Tom
R.
Tyler
E.
Allan
Lind
I.
The
Social
Psychology
of
Authority
A
popular image in novels, films, and biographies is that of a group of people,
typically strangers, thrown together by shipwreck, war, or other calamity, who
must struggle together to survive. William Golding’s novel
Lord
of
the
Flies
(1962) is one example of such a scenario. The novel describes the conflicts
within a group of boys stranded together
on
an island. Under these circumstances
the efforts of groups to survive usually lead them to create rules regulating
interactions or to designate authorities to be responsible for making decisions.
It is not necessary to study groups
on
a desert island to witness the creation of
rules and authority structures. When everyday groups or organizations-legal,
political, managerial,
or
familial-are faced with problems, a common response
is to create rules and empower authorities. This propensity toward structure and
authority has been demonstrated in laboratory experiments
on
rule creation and
social dilemmas, as well as
in
field studies of how people deal with real-world
conflicts and problems of scarcity.
For example, the experimental research of Thibaut and his colleagues shows
that people create rules to preserve profitable, but potentially unstable, rela-
tionships (Murdoch, 1967; Murdoch
&
Rosen, 1970; Thibaut, 1968; Thibaut
&
Faucheux, 1965; Thibaut
&
Gruder, 1969).
In
the seminal Thibaut and Faucheux
experiment, bargaining situations were created that involved two parties whose
power varied along different dimensions: One party had either high or low
influence over the other’s outcomes within the relationship, and the other party
had either good or poor alternatives available outside the group. Thibaut and
Faucheux hypothesized that when one party has high internal power and the other
ADVANCES IN EXPERIMENTAL
SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY. VOL.
25
Copyright
0
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Academic
hss.
Inc.
All
nghls
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reproduclion in
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reserved.
115
116
TOM
R.
TYLER AND E. ALLAN LIND
has good alternatives, a clear threat to the viability of the relationship exists. The
party with higher internal power is tempted to be exploitative, and the lower
power party is then tempted to exit the group. Thibaut and Faucheux found that
people were especially likely to agree on rules regulating behavior in this high-
threat situation, because both parties were motivated to preserve their mutually
beneficial relationship and both had some power with which to bargain.
Another example of the creation of authority structures is found in the research
literature on social dilemmas. Using an experimentally created renewable re-
source pool, Messick and colleagues studied how groups respond to the pos-
sibility that some group members will deplete a resource that benefits everyone in
the group.
A
frequently observed response is for the group to create an authority
structure in which one person regulates the behavior of all members of the group
(Messick et al., 1983; Samuelson, Messick, Rutte,
&
Wilke, 1984).
A real-world example
of
rule creation
in
response to potential conflict is
provided by public responses to the 1974 energy crisis. A survey conducted at the
time showed that the public supported the creation of laws, such as a law
mandating car pooling, that would require all members of the public
to
engage in
conservation behavior (Sears, Tyler, Citrin,
&
Kinder, 1978). The survey respon-
dents preferred mandatory conservation rules to calls for voluntary conservation.
A real-world example of the empowerment of authorities in response to per-
ceived threat is seen
in
polls on fear of crime. Polls show that when the public
feels that crime is a serious problem, people are especially likely to support
increasing the discretionary authority of the police and courts. People are likely
to support allowing the police
to
stop people on the street for identification, to
hold people
in
jail without charges, and to conduct wiretaps (Block, 1971;
Thomas
&
Hyman, 1977). At such times, public endorsement
of
severe punish-
ments such as the death penalty is also greater ('Qler
&
Weber,
1982).'
These examples show two distinct responses to crisis and conflict in groups:
the
creation of rules and laws and the empowerment of authorities.
As
demon-
strated by the Thibaut and Faucheux experiment and the Sears et al. survey,
groups sometimes create impersonal rules and norms to govern the behavior of
group members. On the other hand, as the social dilemma studies and the surveys
on crime show, another response is to empower one
or
more members of the
group to make decisions and issue directives
to
govern group actions. Although
similar in purpose, creating rules and empowering authorities are distinctly dif-
ferent group responses. The creation of a rule restricts the actions of all group
members, whereas the empowerment of an authority restricts the actions of
'We do not mean
to
suggest that perceived threat is the major force driving
the
empowerment of
authorities. The literature in symbolic politics shows that self-interest effects
of
this
sort
do occur, but
public reactions
are
not dominated by self-interest.
As
will
be
seen later in this chapter, the literature
on reactions
to
authorities shows that the impact of self-interest concerns in that context is also rather
limited.
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
117
ordinary members and simultaneously increases the discretion of the leader.
Thus, enacting rules moves power from individuals to an impersonal norm,
whereas constituting authorities conveys power from some individuals to another
individual or to an institution.* This article is devoted to the latter response-the
creation of authorities-and to issues surrounding the legitimacy of leaders. As
seen
in
the second half of this article, the personal aspect of the authority process
is a key element
in
the psychology of legitimacy and obedience.
Of course, social psychologists recognize that creating authority structures is
not a magical solution to problems within groups. To
be
of value, authorities
must function effectively, actually helping the group to solve its problems. Inef-
fective authority structures will not necessarily facilitate group functioning, and
authorities, once created, may make decisions that prove to be counterproduc-
tive. Hence a key issue
in
the study
of
authority is understanding the conditions
under which authorities
in
fact enhance group functioning (Dawes, Orbell, Sim-
mons,
&
van de Kragt,
1986).
A.
WHAT
IS
NEEDED FOR AUTHORITIES
TO FUNCTION EFFECTIVELY?
The first precondition for the effective functioning of authorities is author-
itativeness. That is to say, the directives of authorities can only be effective
when, for whatever reason, people obey them. But compliance is not something
that authorities can simply assume will occur: Research suggests that people do
not automatically accept authorities’ decisions. Studies of legal authorities find
that judges and police officers have difficulty securing compliance with a wide
variety of orders and legal decisions (Tyler,
1990).
Research on small claims
courts, for example, shows that judicial orders are accepted and obeyed only
about
50%
of the time (McEwen
&
Maiman,
1984).
In work settings, studies
show that workers often avoid, resist,
or
ignore the policies and decisions of
management (Lissak,
1983).
In political settings, citizens sometimes disobey
authorities’ directives on issues ranging from paying taxes and fighting wars to
recycling waste and conserving resources. Hence, a problem common to all types
of
organized
groups
and their leaders is the creation of conditions under which
*The distinction between rule-making and authority-empowerment is captured in an item on the
F-scale: “What this country needs most, more than laws and political programs,
is
a few courageous,
tireless, devoted leaders in whom the people can put their faith” (see Robinson
&
Shaver,
1973).
Kelman and Hamilton
(1989)
use
an
interview item that reads “The government must sometimes set
constitutional principles aside in order to deal with problems of the modern
world”.
In some
circumstances these two responses to group crises might be viewed as alternative choices. In other
circumstances both might
be
attempted.
118
TOM
R.
TYLER
AND
E.
ALLAN LIND
leaders will be accepted as authoritative and their decisions obeyed. Understand-
ing these conditions is essential to understanding the psychology of authority.
In this article we focus on one particular aspect of authoritativeness: voluntary
compliance with the decisions of authorities. Social psychologists have long
distinguished between obedience that is the result
of
coercion and obedience that
is the result of internal attitudes and opinions (i.e., “voluntary” compliance).
Raven and French (1958; French
&
Raven, 1959; see also Collins
&
Raven,
1969) describe
reward power
and
coercive power,
in
which obedience is con-
tingent on positive and negative outcomes, and distinguish both of these types of
power from
legitimate power,
in which obedience flows from judgments about
the
legitimacy of the authority. Legitimate power depends on people taking upon
themselves the obligation to obey and voluntarily follow the decisions made
by authorities (Kelman
&
Hamilton, 1989; Qler, 1990). Kelman (1958) dis-
tinguishes between
compliance,
obedience that occurs in response to the provi-
sion of material outcomes;
identijicarion,
obedience that occurs because the
authority is held
in
high esteem; and
internalization,
obedience that occurs
because the values of the authority are accepted (see also Kelman
&
Hamilton,
1989). In Kelman’s typology either identification or internalization can imbue an
authority with legitimacy, leading to voluntary compliance with the authorities’
directives.
In limiting
our
present analysis to internal, legitimacy-related, authority
pro-
cesses we do not mean to suggest that these are the only reasons people obey
authorities, but we do think that these processes represent the most potent and
most interesting reasons for compliance. We have no doubt that behavioral com-
pliance can
be
obtained, at least
in
the short term, by external threats and
rewards, but there is evidence
in
the social psychological literature (beginning
with Raven
&
French, 1958) that obtaining compliance through the use of reward
and coercive power is unwieldy, costly, and time-consuming. In addition, coer-
cive power ultimately fails to control behavior because it can neither eliminate
private disobedience nor assure continued obedience when the mechanism of
coercion (or reward) is removed. Legitimacy, in contrast, nearly always facili-
tates and is often crucial for the effective exercise of authority. Legitimacy, once
established, functions to enhance acceptance
of
decisions as long
as
the authority
is viewed as legitimate (Qler, 1990).
Evidence of the varying effectiveness of different authority structures and
different types
of
power is seen in a classic study by Lewin, Lippitt, and White
(1939) on democratic and autocratic leadership in groups. Lewin et al. showed
that not all authority structures have the same effect on groups. In particular, their
study demonstrated that authority structures differ in their capacity to generate
voluntary compliance with decisions.
Lewin et al. found that groups of boys obeyed the decisions enacted by
democratic leaders following group discussions whether the leaders were present
or
absent. Because obedience was observed even when the leaders were absent,
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
119
it
is clear that the democratic leadership structure produced voluntary com-
pliance. In contrast, groups with autocratic leaders obeyed the decisions enacted
by the leaders when the leaders were present, but not when the leaders were
absent. Thus, for the autocratic groups there was little evidence of voluntary
compliance. Although Lewin et al. did not measure legitimacy per se,
it
is
reasonable to suppose that differences
in
the legitimacy of the democratic and
autocratic leaders mediated the compliance differences seen
in
the study.
This article focuses on legitimacy because
it
is the social attitude most central
to the effectiveness of authorities. It is important to recognize, however, that
legitimacy is not the only attitudinal factor influencing effectiveness. Effective-
ness is also influenced by other cognitions about the authority, most notably
judgments
of
his
or
her expertise with respect to the problem at hand.3 The
willingness
of
group members to accept a leader’s directives is only helpful when
the leader knows what directives to issue.
B.
WHAT
IS
THE PSYCHOLOGICAL
BASIS
OF
LEGITIMACY?
We begin our analysis of the psychology of legitimacy by considering three
theoretical perspectives that have been used to explain how people evaluate their
experiences with organizations and groups: social exchange theories, distributive
justice theories, and procedural justice theories. Theoretical analyses of authority
processes
in
other social sciences, especially
in
political science, make frequent
reference to what is termed “public choice theory” (Laver,
1981),
a utility-based,
outcome-oriented theory that shares many of the assumptions of social exchange
theories
in
social psychology. According to public choice theory-and social
exchange theory-people obey authorities because they view this as the best way
to maximize their outcomes. We contrast these predictions to the predictions of
distributive and procedural justice theories, two alternative explanations of how
people react to social situations.
C. THEORETICAL CONSIDERATIONS
I.
Social
Exchange
Theories
Social exchange theories offer one theoretical perspective that speaks clearly
to what
it
is that governs evaluations
of
group^.^
Social exchange theories and
related models of behavior view people as motivated by self-interest in their
3In the Raven and French taxonomy of types
of
power, expert power (and an associated source of
influence based on control over information) is distinguished from legitimate power.
4We use the term
social
exchange
to
characterize theories based
on
self-interest and the perception
of outcome contingencies.
It
is important, though, that we not oversimplify the
case.
There
are
120
TOM R. TYLER AND E. ALLAN LIND
interactions with others (Blau,
1964;
Homans,
1961;
Kelley
&
Thibaut,
1978;
Thibaut
&
Kelley,
1959).
People enter and leave relationships depending on their
judgments concerning the benefits and costs
of
remaining in the relationship
relative to taking other possible actions; people evaluate interactions in which
they are involved in terms of rewards and costs, and, by extension, people
evaluate and react to authorities and their decisions in terms
of
what they gain
and lose from the authorities' decisions.
Some psychological theories
of
leadership evaluation have adopted the social
exchange perspective in positing that the extent to which leaders will be regarded
as authoritative depends on the ability to provide favorable outcomes to followers
(Hollander,
1980;
Hollander
&
Julian,
1978).
A
generic social exchange model
would suggest that reactions to authorities are, in the final analysis, instrumen-
tally based, developing out of expected or achieved gains and losses. Social
exchange models explain the authority-creating behavior outlined at the begin-
ning
of
this article with reference to the outcomes associated with group mem-
bership: People empower leaders
in
an effort
to
develop and preserve beneficial
group interactions. In social dilemma situations, for example, people do not wish
to lose the renewable resource on which they rely,
so
it is
in
their self-interest to
create authorities. The authorities, in turn, are evaluated against a criterion of
self-interest: i.e., how well they solve problems in the group and maintain the
flow of resources to group members.
Social exchange theories suggest some variables that might
be
important to the
perception of legitimacy.
In
particular, legitimacy should be tied to the extent to
which the authority's decisions and the procedures used to generate those deci-
sions are personally fa~orable.~ The idea that outcomes, presumably assessed
relative to the perceiver's expectations (Thibaut
&
Kelley,
1959),
influence eval-
uations of authorities is a straightforward application of the basic assumption of
self-interest, which underlies all social exchange theories.6 Another factor affect-
ing evaluations
of
procedures, according to social exchange theories, is the
desirability of the procedures themselves, by which we mean the procedure's
transaction costs,
the cost, delay, and frustration experienced in using the pro-
outcome-oriented models of social behavior, such as the Kelley md Thibaut
(1978)
theory of interde-
pendence, that are quite sophisticated about the types of outcomes people seek and the way
in
which
actual outcome contingencies
are
transformed by norms and by cognitive processes. Lind and Earley
(1992)
have pointed
out
that many
of
the relational effects and psychological processes we describe
herein
are
in fact consistent with the Kelley and Thibaut theory.
SRasinski,
bier,
and Fridkin
(1985)
have shown that evaluations
of
authorities
are
based on
performance when the authority's legitimacy is based
on
personal, rather than institutional, loyalty.
6Sophisticated interdependence theories allow for the possibility that "raw" outcome patterns
are
transformed psychologically prior to affecting evaluations and behavior (Kelley
&
Thibaut,
1978;
see
also Lind
&
Earley, 1992).
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
121
cedure (Lissak
&
Sheppard,
1983).
The idea that the desirability of decision-
making procedures affects leader evaluations arises because social exchange
theories view people as willing to sacrifice short-term gain for better long-term
outcomes. That is, people may be willing to accept substantial transaction costs,
as long as they think that the decisions and decision-making procedures of the
authority will benefit them in the long run.
2.
Justice Models
In contrast to social exchange models, justice models suggest that people react
to authorities not by judging whether the authorities’ decisions benefit their
interests, but rather by assessing whether the authority is acting fairly.’ There are
two general classes of justice judgments that have received attention
in
social
psychology: distributive justice judgments, which emphasize the fairness of out-
comes and
of
allocation patterns, and procedural justice judgments, which em-
phasize the fairness of decision-making procedures and other aspects of social
process. Justice theories suggest that authorities will be evaluated positively and
their decisions will be obeyed to the extent that the procedure and the authority’s
decision satisfy justice norms.
There are a number of theories that deal with peo-
ple’s concerns about outcome fairness. This view is represented in psychology by
relative deprivation theories (Crosby,
1976;
Stouffer, Suchman, DeVinney, Star,
&
Williams,
1949)
and equity theories (Adams,
1965;
Walster, Walster,
&
Berscheid,
1978).
Theories of distributive fairness suggest that people evaluate
authorities by comparing the outcomes they receive to the outcomes others
receive and using this comparison to determine whether the outcome distribution
accords with accepted principles of fairness.
Distributive justice theories differ in terms of what is seen as the preeminent
principle of justice. Equity theories (Adams,
1965;
Greenberg,
1990a;
Walster,
Berscheid,
&
Walster,
1973;
Walster
&
Walster,
1975;
Walster et al.,
1978)
focus
on proportionality of inputs and outcomes as the sine qua non of justice. Later
distributive justice work has expanded the list of comparative justice principles to
include such criteria as the equality of outcomes across the group or the distribu-
tion of outcomes according to need.
Another class of distributive justice theories includes those that focus on
feelings of relative deprivation. Relative deprivation theorists (Crosby,
1976,
a.
Distributive Justice.
7Demonstrating that people evaluate outcomes, rules,
or
authorities in justice terms does not
preclude the possibility that justice judgments are influenced by a concern with self-interest. In fact,
distributive justice theories originally developed within the context of social exchange theory. Justice
theories
are
important here because they suggest factors-distributive and procedural justice-that
have some substantial variation beyond that which can
be
accounted for by simple self-interest.
122
TOM R. TYLER AND E. ALLAN LIND
1982; Folger, 1986; Masters
&
Smith, 1987; Olson, Herman,
&
Zanna, 1986)
argue that the fundamental source of feelings of injustice is the realization that
one’s outcomes fall short of expectations. Expectations are derived, in turn, both
from imagined outcomes under different circumstances and from the outcomes of
salient others. For relative deprivation theorists, the key questions concern the
generation of expectations and the cognitive process by which people explain
why their actual outcomes fall short of expectations. The end product of these
cognitive processes is the same as that which is of interest to equity theorists,
however: the feeling that outcomes are unfair.
We consider distributive justice judgments as possible factors in legitimacy
because distributive justice theories of all types view outcome fairness judgments
as a critical factor
in
determining people’s satisfaction with the groups and
organizations
to
which they belong. In addition, there is a substantial body of
research linking distributive justice judgments to variables closely related to
legitimacy. For example, relative deprivation studies have linked the perceived
injustice of outcomes to political unrest, and equity studies have shown that
inequity affects satisfaction with work settings and organizations.
People’s reactions
to
authorities’ decisions have also
been linked to judgments about the fairness of the procedures used to make
decisions. Procedural justice theories suggest that people focus on how decisions
are
made, as well as the decisions themselves,
in
making justice evaluations
(Leventhal, 1976, 1980; Lind
&
Tyler, 1988; Thibaut
&
Walker, 1975, 1978).
Since the publication of
Procedural Justice
by John Thibaut and Laurens Walker
(1973, a substantial body
of
research has addressed issues of procedural justice
(see Lind
&
Tyler, 1988, for a recent review).
As
research has accumulated, it
has become evident that fairness judgments concerning informal social process
are
so
similar in cause and consequence to fairness judgments concerning formal
decision-making procedures that they can be considered simply to be different
manifestations
of
the same type of justice judgment (cf. Bies
&
Moag, 1986;
Lind
&
Tyler, 1988, p. 214; Tyler
&
Bies, 1990). The findings of the initial
Thibaut and Walker research-that the procedures used to arrive at a decision can
have profound effects on fairness judgments-have been widely confirmed in
subsequent studies of legal trial procedures (e.g., Lind, Kurtz, Musante, Walker,
&
Thibaut, 1980),
in
studies
of
nontrial procedures used
in
resolving legal
disputes, such as plea bargaining (Casper, Tyler,
&
Fisher, 1988; Houlden,
1980), mediation, and arbitration (Adler, Hensler,
&
Nelson, 1983; Lind, Mac-
Coun et a]., 1989, 1990; MacCoun, Lind, Hensler, Bryant,
&
Ebener, 1988),
and in studies
of
police officer dealings with citizens (Tyler, 1988, 1990; Tyler
&
Folger, 1980). In addition, researchers have found that concerns about procedural
justice extend to organizational (Folger
&
Greenberg, 1985; Greenberg
&
Folger,
1983; Sheppard, 1984), political (Qler
&
Caine, 1981), interpersonal (Barrett-
Howard
&
Qler, 1986), and educational (Qler
&
Caine, 1981) settings. In fact,
b.
Procedural Justice.
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
123
wherever procedural justice issues have been studied they have emerged as an
important concern.
*
Procedural justice has been shown to be an important factor in the evaluation
of groups and institutions. Studies of legal authorities (Tyler, 1984, 1990),
politi-
cal authorities (Tyler
&
Caine, 1981; Tyler, Rasinski,
&
McGraw, 1985), and
managerial authorities (Alexander
&
Ruderman, 1987; Folger
&
Konovsky,
1989) all provide evidence that judgments about the fairness of procedures shape
evaluations of authorities. At first glance, this may seem unremarkable, since
procedures structure the behavior of authorities, but the link between the evalua-
tions of procedures and the evaluations of those who enact the procedures has
been seen even in circumstances, such as formal legal trials, where the authority
has relatively little leeway
in
deciding which procedure to use.
3.
Summary: Factors Affecting Legitimacy
The three sets of theories outlined above suggest a number
of
factors that
people might use when they evaluate the authorities with whom they deal. These
factors can be differentiated
in
terms of the extent to which they concern outcome
versus procedures and the extent to which they involve assessments of the benefit
or cost of outcomes or procedures versus assessments of fairness. Figure
1
illus-
trates the dimensions and factors that serve as the focus of
our
review of research
on legitimacy.
We
turn
in the next section to a review of research on legitimacy and the
evaluation of leaders. The key empirical question is how four factors-outcome
favorability, procedural desirability, distributive fairness, and procedural fair-
ness-affect reactions to authorities.
A
second question, which is essential to
understanding the implications of the findings for the psychology of authority,
takes
us
one step back the causal chain. Once we have determined which of these
four factors are most important to legitimacy, we
will
explore the psychological
processes underlying that factor.
We will examine two general types of studies: those that address specific
experiences with authorities (e.g., “When
I
was stopped by a police officer last
month and given a traffic ticket”) and those that explore overall judgments based
on multiple encounters with the authority
in
question (e.g., “My supervisor
generally makes decisions following fair procedures”). Because
our
interest is in
cross-situational determinants of legitimacy, we examine research conducted
in
a
variety of settings, looking for patterns of findings that appear to be general and
not restricted to a particular setting.
*See Qler and Lind
(1990)
for
a discussion
of
some potential limits
to
the procedural justice
effect.
It
is an empirical question whether procedural justice concerns affect the treatment
of
indi-
viduals outside the boundary
of
the
group.
124
Proc4Ursl
Desirablllty
TOM
R.
TYLER AND E. ALLAN LIND
Procedural
Falrneas
Outcomes
fairness
Fairness
What types of reactions are of concern?
As
already noted, attitudes about the
legitimacy of authorities appear
to
be a key antecedent of compliance. Hence, we
are interested in legitimacy and related judgments
of
leaders and other au-
thoritie~.~ Of course, data showing compliant behavior per se are of interest. We
also report findings
on
attitudinal and belief variables that seem closely linked to
legitimacy and on behaviors that seem likely
to
be associated with either legiti-
macy or compliance.
D.
EMPIRICAL STUDIES
Studies of authority, legitimacy, and compliance have used nonexperimental
research designs more frequently than is the case in many other areas of social
psychology. The reliance
on
nonexperimental designs is logical: Authority by its
very nature implies a certain level of group structure, and the short-lived and
undifferentiated groups used
in
most laboratory research
on
group processes are
not well-suited for the study of such a phenomenon (Sears,
1986).
Researchers
have generally found
it
easier and more fruitful to study existing authorities in
real-world settings, even though these settings often preclude the use of experi-
mental designs. But this aspect
of
authority research raises some special prob-
lems. Social psychologists have traditionally viewed the findings of nonexperi-
%us,
we do not examine the large literature on the antecedents
of
personal reactions
to
deci-
sions, i.e., personal satisfaction and affective reactions to experiences.
We
are
only concerned with
such feelings
to
the extent they affect evaluations
of
authorities.
A
negative outcome might leave one
unhappy, but this unhappiness only has implications
for
authority processes if the authority is held
responsible.
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
125
mental studies with skepticism. In particular, they have been loath to draw causal
inferences from correlational data. Fortunately, the literature on the psychology
of authority offers a solution: Although a majority of the studies are single-shot
survey studies, wherein causal inference is admittedly problematic, most of the
key findings have been confirmed
in
studies that offer much more “leverage” on
causal issues. We will point out, as we review the literature, these critical stud-
ies-laboratory experiments and panel studies designed to resolve causal ambi-
guity-and we will attempt to give the reader a clear picture of which findings
can lay claim to clear causality and which cannot.
1.
Attitudes toward Authorities
a. Legal Authority.
51er (1984) examined the relationship between people’s
judgments of outcome favorability, distributive fairness, and procedural fairness
in
small claims court experiences and their attitudes about the legitimacy of the
legal authorities they encountered. He found that procedural fairness had a signif-
icant relationship to legitimacy
(p
=
.19,
p
<
.001), as did distributive fairness
(p
=
.24,
p
<
.001). Outcome favorability had no significant relationship
(p
=
.03, nonsignificant [n.~.]).
This finding was replicated
in
another study of experiences with legal au-
thorities, which included experiences with both judges and police officers (Tyler,
1990). The study used a cross-sectional design that involved interviewing a
random sample of Chicago residents
(n
=
1575). Tyler analyzed the attitudes of
those respondents in the sample who had had recent personal experience with
legal authorities
(n
=
652). He found that the respondents’ views about the
legitimacy of the legal authority were correlated with judgments of the pro-
cedural justice of their recent experience
(r
=
.19,
p
<
.001) and the distributive
justice of the outcome of the experience
(r
=
.15,
p
<
.001),
but were not
strongly related to the favorability of the outcome
(r
=
.08,
n.s.).
Tyler, Casper, and Fisher (1989) examined the relationship between evalua-
tions of criminal justice system experiences and general attitudes about the
legitimacy of law and government. Their study used a panel sample of defen-
dants on trial for felonies
in
criminal court
(n
=
329). The defendants were
interviewed both before and after their encounter with the courts. The results,
including a causal model diagrammed in Fig. 2,’O indicate that procedural justice
judgments show the strongest relationship to attitudes about the legitimacy of
legal authorities, law, and government, and that neither distributive justice judg-
ments nor the favorability of sentences had much direct impact on attitudes about
“JFigure
2
presents only a portion
of
the
Qler,
Casper,
and
Fisher model.
The
full
path model
can
be
found in the original
article.
TOM
R.
TYLER AND E. ALLAN LlND
Sentence
Fig.
2.
Effects
of
sentence on attitudes toward law and legal authorities. From
Sler,
Casper,
and Fisher
(1989).
authorities. The panel design used in this study allows for strong causal
inferences because it can control statistically for prior attitudes about author-
ities.
Although these findings suggest that procedural justice is an important factor
in
legitimacy, it is important not to overstate the case. In both the Vler (1990)
and the Tyler et al. (1989) studies, outcome factors were found to influence
procedural fairness judgments (i.e., those who won were more likely to think
that the process was fair). Through their influence on fairness judgments, out-
come factors had an indirect influence on attitudes about authorities and rule-
related behavior. We will return to this issue later in this article.
Alexander and Ruderman (1987) examined the
relationship between distributive and procedural fairness and trust in manage-
ment
among
2800
federal employees. The employees were interviewed about
various aspects of the job environment, including the fairness of decision-making
procedures and outcomes. Their judgments about the job environment were then
used to predict their overall evaluations of management. Alexander and Ruder-
man (1987) found that evaluations of management were influenced both by
employee assessments of the fairness of outcomes (unique variance explained
=
5%)
and by their assessments of the fairness of decision-making procedures
within their work setting (unique variance explained
=
11%).
Several studies have examined the factors that influence commitment to orga-
nizations, a positive attitude toward the organization that is similar in concept to
legitimacy (see O’Reilly
&
Chatman, 1986). Studying manufacturing workers,
6.
Managerial
Aurhorify.
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
127
Folger and Konovsky (1989) examined the relationship between judgments of the
distributive and procedural fairness of pay raises and workers’ organizational
commitment. They found that procedural justice explained significant variance in
organizational commitment
(r
=
.43,
p
<
.001), as did distributive justice
(r
=
.33,
p
<
.001). The actual dollar amount of raises had no impact on organiza-
tional commitment
(r
=
.11,
n.s.1. Tyler and Schuller (1990) studied organiza-
tional commitment and evaluations of supervisors by employees
in
a variety of
work settings. They interviewed a random sample of 409 workers
in
the Chicago
area about recent personal experiences with a supervisor. Attitudinal reactions to
supervisors were found to be more closely related to procedural justice judg-
ments than to favorability
or
distributive justice judgments (see Table I).
All of these studies suggest that procedural justice judgments play a central
role
in
determining how authorities are viewed in organizational settings. An
experimental study by Kanfer, Sawyer, Earley, and Lind (1987) confirms the
direction of causality. Kanfer et al. had student subjects work on a task that was
evaluated using either fair or unfair procedures. The subjects rated their super-
visor higher when the procedure was fair than when
it
was unfair.
Tyler and Caine (1981) used both experimental and
correlational methods to study the factors affecting evaluations of political lead-
ers.
In
an experimental scenario study they manipulated the fairness of the
procedure that a political leader used to make a decision. The scenarios also
manipulated the favorability of the decision. The results showed that both pro-
cedural justice and outcome favorability influenced evaluations of the leader.
In
a
second, correlational, study Tyler and Caine asked respondents about the fairness
of the political decision-making process and about the favorability and fairness of
political decisions. The survey results showed that procedural fairness judgments
c. Political Authority.
TABLE
I
EXPERJENCES
WITH
SUPERVISOR: ATTITUDINAL REACTIONP
Supervisor Supervisor Management Organizational
competence trust evaluation commitment
Outcome favorability
-.Ol
.04
.oo
.I3
Relative outcome favorability
-.I1
-
.06
.
00
.04
Relative procedural desirability
.06
.02
.05
.oo
Distributive justice
.06
.oo
.I0
.08
Procedural justice
.73**
.77**
.39**
.21*
Total
R2
.56
.60
.22
.I4
“N
=
409.
Entries are standardized regression coefficients
for
an equation including all five predictors.
From
Tyler
and Schuller
(1990).
*p
<
.01.
**p
<
,001.
I28
TOM R. TYLER AND E. ALLAN LIND
were significantly correlated with evaluations of political leaders, whereas out-
come fairness and favorability showed smaller, and often nonsignificant, correla-
tions with leader evaluations.
vier,
Rasinski, and McGraw
(1985)
studied the relationship between outcome
favorability, distributive fairness, and procedural fairness and trust in the national
government. They found that procedural justice showed a strong independent
relationship to the trust measure
(p
=.61,
p
<
.001;
see Table
II),
with lesser
relationships for measures of absolute outcomes
(p
=.
11,
n.s.) and distributive
fairness
(p
=
-.01, n.s.).
TABLE
I1
JUSTICE
AND
THE
ENDORSEMENT
OF
POLITICAL AUTHORITIES"
Evaluations of Reagan Trust in national government
P
R2
P
R2
Outcome level
Absolute
Relative
Total
Fairness
Distributive
Procedural
Total
Demographics
Party
Liberalism
Age
Education
Race
Sex
Total
Total
Outcome beyond fairness and
Fairness beyond outcome and
Demographics beyond
demographics
demographics
outcome and fairness
.09
-
.04
.lI*
.47***
.20***
.16***
-
.Ol
.oo
.06
.13**
.I1
-
.04
.08***
.07*
*
*
-.01
.61***
.45*** .34***
-.I0
-
.03
.oo
-
.02
.oo
-.05
.30***
.oo
.54*** .34***
Usefulness analyses
.oo
.01***
.19***
.28***
.09***
.oo
"Entries in
p
columns are standardized regression coefficients; entries in
R2
columns are squared adjusted
*p
<
.05.
**p
<
.Ol.
***p
<
,001.
multiple correlation coefficients. From
Tyler,
Rasinski, and McGraw
(1985).
AUTHORITY
IN GROUPS
129
2.
Legitimacy and Behavior
Several studies show that the effects of procedural justice extend beyond
attitudes to include compliance and related behaviors.
a.
Behavior in the Legal Arena.
MacCoun et al.
(1988)
studied litigants in
cases involving automobile claims in the New Jersey courts and found that
judgments of procedural justice correlated with intentions to accept
or
reject the
arbitrator's award
(r
=
.40,
p
<
.001),
as did ratings of the favorability of the
award
(r
=
.30,
p
<
.001).
Lind, Kulik, Ambrose, and Park
(1991),
in
a study that examined dispute
resolution by authoritative decision
in
federal court, found that procedural justice
judgments have strong effects
on
the acceptance of legal decisions. Lind et al.
studied a court program
in
which arbitrators issued awards that the parties to the
lawsuit were free
to
either accept
or
reject. Figure
3
shows the result of structural
equation analysis of the influence of outcome favorability, relational process
concerns (of the sort described later
in
this article), and procedural justice judg-
ments
on
acceptance of the arbitration award. The values in the figure are
standardized path coefficients. Two features of the final path model are important
here. First, there was
no
direct path from outcome favorability to acceptance of
the award; the only outcome effects were those mediated by procedural justice
Judamaar
Fig.
3.
Effects
of
procedural justice on acceptance
of
arbitration awards. n.s., not significant.
From Lind, Kulik, Ambrose, and Park
(1991).
130
TOM R. TYLER
AND
E.
ALLAN LIND
judgments. Second, the link between procedural justice judgments and accep-
tance of the award was very strong indeed, as shown by the large path coeffi-
cient. When procedures were viewed as unfair,
54%
of the awards were accept-
ed, but when procedures were viewed as fair
77%
of the awards were accepted.
The study is especially noteworthy because the cases
in
question involved
amounts ranging from
$5000
to
$5,000,000
and because the decision to accept
an arbitration award resulted
in
the transfer of tens, or even hundreds, of thou-
sands of dollars.
Tyler
(1990)
studied compliance with laws using a panel design in which
respondents were interviewed at two points
in
time,
1
year apart. In one part of
his
study, Tyler examined the views of the respondents in the panel sample who
reported having some experience with legal authorities during the interval be-
tween the two interviews
(n
=
291).
The results
of
a causal analysis of these data
are shown
in
Fig.
4.
There are no significant paths from outcome favorability to
evaluations of authorities
or
compliant behavior. This indicates that the outcome
of experience did not directly affect evaluations of the authority
or
obedience to
laws. The significant causal paths
run
from judgments of fairness to attitudes and
behaviors. Procedural justice judgments affected views about the legitimacy of
legal authorities. And legitimacy judgments, in turn, affected compliance with
laws. In addition, distributive justice judgments directly affected compliance
with laws.
compliance
&lam,
Fig.
4.
Panel analysis
of
experience, views about legal authority, and compliance.
From
Sler
(
1990).
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
131
6.
Behavior
in
Organizational Settings.
Several studies show procedural jus-
tice effects on behaviors related to legitimacy and compliance
in
work settings.
An
experimental demonstration of the behavioral effects of unfair procedures
in
work settings is found
in
Greenberg (1989).
In
that study college students
in
a
work experiment experienced either fair
or
unfair work evaluation procedures.
Later, the participants were placed
in
a room that had a poster with telephone
numbers for reporting unfair treatment to an “ethical responsibility board.”
Greenberg found that experiencing an unfair procedure led participants to take
slips of paper with the telephone number attached, suggesting an intention to
report the unfair procedure to the ethics board. The study also showed a pro-
cedure by outcome interaction, with both an unfair procedure and an unfairly
negative outcome necessary for protest behavior to occur.
I’
The behavior in
question, a type of protest against the authority in question, is not compliance per
se, but rather a behavioral indicator of perceptions of legitimacy,
or
more pre-
cisely perceptions of the absence of legitimacy.
Tyler and Schuller
(
1990) also examined influences
on
organizational behav-
iors related to legitimacy (decision acceptance, rule following, turnover inten-
tion, and grievance filing). The behaviors in question were measured using self-
reports
in
a general population survey of working people. Table
111
reports the
results of regression analyses predicting the behaviors from ratings of outcome
and procedural desirability and distributive and procedural justice
in
recent expe-
riences with supervisors.
As
can be seen from the table, some of the behaviors
showed significant links to outcome favorability and distributive justice, but
procedural justice was the strongest and most consistent predictor of all four
behaviors.
Earley and Lind (1987) examined the influence of the fairness of task assign-
ment procedures on people’s acceptance of task assignments
in
both a laboratory
and a field setting; experimental methods were employed in both settings. Causal
analyses of the results of the study showed that ratings of the acceptance of the
task assignment decision were affected by procedural justice judgments in both
settings. In both studies, either the procedural justice manipulation
or
measures
of perceived procedural fairness were found to cause differences in performance
that mirrored the findings for acceptance of the decision.
Lind, Kanfer, and Earley (1990) report similar findings
in
a laboratory experi-
ment on the acceptance of goal assignments in a simulated work setting: The
manipulation of a variable-the opportunity to voice one’s views about the
assigned goal-that is closely linked to procedural justice judgments resulted
in
higher rated acceptance of the goal and better performance. Unfortunately, in
neither the Earley and Lind nor the Lind, Kanfer, and Earley study was the
perceived legitimacy of the supervisor measured. Thus, although all three of the
”For
a
more
detailed discussion
of
such interaction effects, see Lind and Qler
(1988,
pp.
67-68).
132
TOM R. TYLER AND E. ALLAN LIND
TABLE
I11
EXPERIENCES
WITH
SUPERVISOR: BEHAVIORAL
REACTIONS~
Accept
Follow
Intention Intention to
sue
decision rules
to
quit organization
Outcome favorability .22**
.I2
-
.02 -.13
Relative outcome favorability
.12*
.07
.oo
.07
Relative
procedural
desirability
.09
.01
.03
-.I1
Distributive justice
.08
.23*
-
.09
-
.02
Procedural justice
.37**
.26*
*
-.28**
-
.20*
Total
R2
.48
.05
.I1
.03
"N
=
409.
Entries
are
standardized regresssion coefficients
for
an
equation including
all
five predictors.
From
Sler
and Schuller
(1990).
*p
<
.Ol.
**p
<
.WI.
studies establish rather clearly that there is a causal link between procedural
justice and ratings
of
decision acceptance, they do not establish that perceived
legitimacy mediated acceptance
of
the decision. However, taken together with
the 51er and Schuller survey findings and the findings reported in the previous
sections showing that judgments of procedural justice enhance the legitimacy of
leaders, these three studies point to procedural fairness as a major factor in
compliance with authorities.
Procedural justice judgments have also been found to
influence behaviors associated with the acceptance of political authorities.
Rasinski and Tyler
(1
987)
conducted two studies exploring the relationship
be-
tween procedural justice judgments and political behavior in the
1986
presiden-
tial election. In both studies citizens' vote choices were correlated with judg-
ments about the relative procedural fairness of the two presidential candidates.
Judgments about past benefits and costs associated with government policies also
correlated with vote choice.
Rasinski
(1988)
examined the relationship between justice concerns and politi-
cal behaviors, using a sample
of
398
residents of Chicago. He studied both
general political activity (e.g., working on a political campaign, displaying
campaign buttons) and activism related to government benefits and services
(e.g., contacting a political official about benefits or services, demonstrating for
benefits or services). Both types of behavior showed substantial links to pro-
cedural justice judgments. The strongest relationship was found for political
activity related to specific benefits government benefits and services (logistic
coefficient
=
0.42,
p
<
.05).
A
weaker relationship was found for general
political activity (logistic coefficient
=
0.32,
p
<
.lo).
Political activity relating
to specific benefits and services was also linked to outcome favorability concerns
c.
Political
Behavior.
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
133
(coefficient
=
.025,
p
<
. lo), but not to distributive fairness (coefficient
=
0.22,
n.s.). General political activity did not show substantial links to either outcome
favorability (coefficient
=
0.15,
n.s.)
or
distributive fairness (coefficient
=
0.43,
n.s.). The studies on litigants’ reactions to court pro-
cedures, which we reviewed above, show that procedural justice plays a consid-
erable role
in
the decision to accept an arbitration judgment. There is evidence
that procedural justice is also important for compliance
in
less formal dispute
resolution settings. Pruitt, Peirce, McGillicuddy, Welton, and Castrianno (1990)
also found that long-term compliance with mediation outcomes was linked to
judgments of the fairness
of
the mediation procedure
(r
=
.32,
p
<
.05).
In fact,
procedural justice was a more potent determinant of compliance than was the use
of joint problem solving, a factor that has long been thought to be the cornerstone
of
successful mediation.
d.
Disputing Behavior.
3.
Summary and Implications
The research described above shows that a key factor affecting legitimacy
across a variety of settings is the person’s evaluation of the fairness of the
procedures used by the authority
in
question. The studies that have included
behavioral measures show much the same pattern of results with respect to
measures of obedience and other behaviors linked to authority. Evaluations
of
both the favorability of the authority’s decision and its distributive fairness have
occasionally been found to exert an effect on legitimacy independent
of
that
exerted by procedural fairness. It is clear, though, that
in
terms of both the
strength of effects and the ubiquity of effects, neither outcome factor is nearly as
important as procedural justice in determining whether an authority is viewed as
legitimate.
l2
Why is procedural justice
so
central to legitimacy? One explanation can be
found
in
some of the original theorizing on the psychology of procedural justice.
In
their discussion of the problems of dispute resolution in groups, Thibaut and
Walker (1975) noted the potential harm that the process of resolving disputes
could do to social relationships within a group
or
society: poorly resolved dis-
putes can threaten enduring relationships. They argued that the use of procedures
regarded as fair by all parties facilitates the maintenance
of
positive relations
among group members, preserving the “fabric of society,” even
in
the face of the
‘*As noted above,
it
is important
to
distinguish personal satisfaction from attitudes such as
legitimacy. We are not saying that people
are
happy if they receive unfavorable outcomes through a
fair procedure. We are saying, however, that they
(I)
are more likely
to
accept the decision and
(2)
are
less likely
to
blame the authorities and/or institutions they have dealt with.
As
a consequence, they
are
more likely
to
follow the authority’s directives
in
the future. See Lind and Earley
(1992)
and
Messick and Sentis
(1983)
for discussions of the distinction between satisfaction and fairness.
134
TOM R. TYLER AND E. ALLAN LIND
conff ict of interest that exists in any group whose members have different prefer-
ence structures and different beliefs concerning how the group should manage its
affairs (Thibaut
&
Walker,
1975,
p.
67).
A
second reason for the preeminence of procedural justice concerns in judg-
ments of the legitimacy of authority is found
in
a later analysis by Thibaut and
Walker
(1978).
In many social situations
it
is not at all clear what decision or
action is correct
in
an objective sense. Indeed, it could be argued that most group
decisions concern questions for which, at least at the time the decision is made,
there is no way of knowing what course of action will work out best. In these
circumstances, Thibaut and Walker argue, what is critical to good decision-
making is adherence to norms of fairness, and fairness is most evident when
procedures that are accepted as just are used to generate the decision. In other
words, absent objective indicators of the correctness of a decision, the best
guarantee of decision quality is the use of good-which is to say fair-pro-
cedures. In terms used by Lind and Earley
(1992;
Lind et al.,
1991),
procedural
fairness serves as a social heuristic that allows people to determine whether an
action (e.g., obeying the decision of an authority) is correct without really
weighing all the benefits and costs associated with the action.
For an example of the difficulty of clearly establishing the “correct” solu-
tion to allocation problems in an organizational setting, consider the problems
involved in using equity criteria to determine whether one is fairly compen-
sated. According
to
equity theory, relevant inputs must be compared to relevant
outcomes, and the resulting ratio must be compared across other members of
the workplace group. But how can one compare and weight outcomes such as
interestingness of work, office size and amenities, vacation options, parking
spaces, pay, and the myriad other aspects of work life? Similar problems exist for
comparing inputs across individuals. Imagine the difficulty of managing a psy-
chological “equation” of this
sort
to determine the extent to which one’s out-
comes are fair.
A
much simpler approach is to assume that fair outcomes result
from fair procedures, and to look for signs that the procedure used to allocate a
given outcome is fair or unfair.
A related reason for the importance accorded procedural justice concerns in
judgments of legitimacy has to do with links between perceptions of procedures
and other cognitions about groups. In an earlier analysis (Lind
&
’Qler,
1988)
we
have argued that procedures are widely viewed as essential elements of any
lasting group and that perceptions of procedures are therefore key cognitions
about groups. It is no accident, for example, that the drafting
of
a constitution is
generally one of the first enterprises of any group that intends to function on a
continuing basis. Through the design of its procedures a group gives itself form
and makes manifest its values and goals. Because procedures are widely viewed
as manifestations of group values, we argue, they take on enormous symbolic
significance for other cognitions about groups. According to this line of thought,
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
135
perceptions of procedures have greater impact on evaluations of groups than do
perceptions of outcomes, because outcomes are generally viewed as one-time
responses to particular situations whereas procedures have an enduring quality;
this makes an unfair
procedure
much more threatening than a single unfair
outcome.
In much the same way, the procedures used by an authority to reach a
decision might be seen as an expression of the authority’s values, and the judg-
ment that an authority uses unfair procedures might be viewed with greater
concern than the judgment that
a
particular decision is unfair. This explanation of
procedural justice processes can be combined with the Thibaut and Walker and
Lind and Earley arguments to explain why
it
is
procedural
fairness, rather than
distributive
fairness that is the critical element of the fairness heuristic and, thus,
central to the decision to obey authority.
Whatever the explanation, the results reviewed above suggest that the use of
fair procedures is an important element, perhaps the key element, for the effec-
tive exercise of legitimate authority. If we want to understand the dynamics of
authority, we must explore the psychology of procedural justice as
it
relates to
authority. We turn to this task after a consideration of some of the societal
implications of the findings described above.
4.
Authority from a Societal Perspective
Effectively exercising authority is a core issue
in
any organized group. Hence,
the questions that we have been examining are always important. They become
especially important
in
situations of resource scarcity, when social conflict is
more likely and when allocation is more problematic. As we noted above, the
empowerment of authorities seems to be a common response of groups to social
conflict and the need to allocate scarce
or
diminishing resources, and yet it is
precisely
in
such situations that the actions of authorities are most likely to be
controversial.
It is certainly the case that periods of social conflict and resource scarcity have
prompted social psychologists to devote particular attention to problems of au-
thority. In the period around World War
11,
a central social concern in America
was understanding how to manage ethnic, racial, and industrial conflict. Re-
search at that time addressed the nature of rules and authority structures and the
relation of authority structures to the interactions occurring among group mem-
bers (Lewin et al.,
1939)
and between groups (Sherif, Harvey, White,
Hood,
&
Sherif,
1961;
Sherif
&
Sherif,
1953).
A
common theme in much of this research
was that effectively designed social structures could dampen destructive social
conflict, an argument that encouraged the development of substantial literatures
on leadership and group dynamics (Cartwright
&
Zander,
1953).
Another period during which concerns about scarcity emerged as important
social issues was the
1970s.
During this period, issues of scarcity and natural
136
TOM
R.
TYLER AND
E.
ALLAN LIND
resource management were highly salient, with many authors suggesting that the
United States was moving into an new era of social conflict stimulated by
resource scarcity and economic decline (Blumberg, 1980; decarufel, 198 1;
Deutsch, 1981; Greenberg, 1981; Lerner, 1981; Ophuls, 1977). Growing social
conflict seemed likely to increase political and social instability and unrest.
Examples of heightened conflict during this era include disputes concerning
the allocation of scarce energy resources and debates over the use of nuclear
power.
The possibility of heightened social conflict was viewed as especially prob-
lematic for American government authorities during the 1970s because the
United States was
in
a historic period during which
it
seemed particularly vul-
nerable to social unrest. Alienation from and distrust of legal, political, and
industrial authorities was quite high (Caddell, 1979; Citrin, 1974; Lipset and
Schneider, 1983; Miller, 1974, 1979, 1983; Wright, 1981). Because the legiti-
macy of authorities is often viewed as a “cushion of support” that helps societies
to survive difficult periods in history (Easton, 1965), the weakness of the support
underlying the American legal, political, and economic systems seemed to point
to a potentially dangerous vulnerability to destructive social unrest.
Responses in the social and behavioral sciences to the concerns about scarcity
and conflict during the 1970s included the expansion of research on social dilem-
mas and procedural justice. The research on social dilemmas flowed directly
from a concern with developing ways to manage exhaustible supplies of natural
resources. Similarly, psychologists’ initial interest
in
procedural justice devel-
oped from a concern with conflict over resowes.
As
Thibaut and Walker noted
at the very beginning of their book on procedural justice:
One prediction that can be advanced with sure confidence is that human life on this planet
faces a steady increase in the potential for interpersonal and intergroup conflict. The rising
expectations of a continuously more numerous population in competition for control over
rapidly diminishing resources create the conditions
for
an increasingly dangerous exis-
tence.
It
seems clear that the quality of future human life is likely
to
be
importantly
determined by the effectiveness with which disputes can
be
managed, moderated,
or
resolved. Procedures
or
methods that may be put
to
this task of conflict resolution there-
fore claim
our
attention. (Thibaut
&
Walker,
1975,
p.
1)
We believe that the social issues that are likely to emerge as central concerns of
the 1990s also demonstrate the importance of legitimacy and authority processes.
The enormous changes occurring in the governments of Eastern Europe, the
former Soviet Union, and East Germany illustrate dramatically the fragility of
authority without legitimacy. The efforts to reconstruct the governments of these
nations as well as the creation of new authorities in the European Economic
Community illustrate the importance of understanding what makes a political
authority legitimate. Efforts to discover how a nation-state can command the
allegiance and obedience of various ethnic and regional constituencies, a prob-
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
137
lem illustrated by ethnic conflicts
in
the United States, the former Soviet Union,
the Middle East, Eastern Europe, and Canada, also point out how important it is
to understand the psychological foundations of authority processes.
In the United States many commentators expect that conflict over resource
allocation and social values will be intensified as we become a more multiethnic,
multicultural society. There is little doubt that the years ahead will see heightened
conflicts over the balance between a “melting pot” model of American society,
in
which immigrants are expected to assimilate into existing culture, and a model
in which immigrant groups preserve their unique cultures. Conflict of this sort
has already emerged in both the United States and Canada in discussions of
bilingualism. Conflicts over resource allocation will also be intensified by the
efforts of traditionally disadvantaged groups-Blacks, Native Americans, and
women-to secure policies that correct historical injustices.
Perhaps the most dangerous conflicts
of
the
1990s
are those that turn
on
the
definition of legal rights, because rights cannot
be
easily compromised and
therefore solutions to rights conflicts are particularly difficult to find. One of the
most visible
of
these conflicts is that concerning abortion rights, but similar
struggles are occurring over issues such as gay rights and the death penalty. As
these conflicts are played out in the courts and in the electoral process, authorities
must struggle to govern
in
the face of a substantial diversity of attitudes, beliefs,
and values. Legitimacy becomes an especially important, but perhaps also an
especially elusive, quality of government.
Authority and legitimacy
are
issues of great importance in organizational
settings as well. Supervisors often find themselves trapped between a desire not
to “micromanage” and concerns that subordinates will not do what they are told.
Close monitoring of subordinates’ actions entails substantial costs and, paradox-
ically, leads to even less confidence on the part of supervisors that their orders
will
be obeyed (Strickland,
1958).
In addition,
if
obedience is obtained by the
use of coercive power, resentment and private disobedience are likely to pose
new problems for the organization.
A
better solution is the establishment of
legitimacy on the part of supervisors
in
order to obtain voluntary compliance.
11.
The Social Psychology
of
Procedural Justice
The research described above suggests that people evaluate legitimacy for the
most part in procedural justice terms. Thus, to understand what drives legiti-
macy, we must understand what drives procedural justice judgments. In the
following sections we review briefly existing theory and research on what makes
procedures appear to be fair, devoting particular attention to those features that
seem likely to affect procedural justice judgments in the context of interactions
with authorities.
138
TOM R. TYLER AND
E.
ALLAN LIND
A. THEORIES
OF
PROCEDURAL JUSTICE
In the
20
years since social psychologists began to study procedural justice
judgments, a number of theories and models have been advanced to explain
procedural justice phenomena. In reviewing these explanations, we divide them
into two general categories. One category includes theories that view procedural
justice judgments as determined largely by outcomes and by concerns external to
the procedure and the interaction with authority. These theories, which we term
instrumental models,
view procedural justice judgments as founded ultimately on
how well the procedure in question serves interests external to the experience of
the procedure. The second category includes what we term
relational models,
which focus on relationship issues, especially perceptions of the relationship
between the authority and those subject to his or her decision.
I.
Instrumental Models
of
Procedural Justice
Thibaut and Walker
(1975,
1978)
advanced a control-oriented model of what
drives judgments about the fairness of dispute resolution procedures. The
Thibaut and Walker analysis argues that the key procedural characteristic shaping
people’s views about the fairness of the procedures is the distribution
of
control
between disputants and the third-party decision-maker. Thibaut and Walker dis-
tinguish between two types of control: process control and decision control.
Process control refers to the extent and nature of a disputant’s control over the
presentation of evidence. Decision control refers to the extent and nature
of
a
disputant’s control over the actual decisions made.
Thibaut and Walker assume that disputants are primarily concerned with the
problem or dispute that brings them to third parties. Judgments of the fairness of
various dispute resolution procedures are based on
instrumental concerns
in
the
sense that disputants are thought to view procedures as means to the end
of
improving either their own outcomes or their relationship with the person with
whom they have a dispute. Thibaut and Walker do not devote much attention to
disputants’ concerns about their long-term relationship with the authority who
serves as a third party in the dispute resolution procedure. Implicit
in
the Thibaut
and Walker analysis is the assumption that by and large disputants view their
experience with the judge and the court system as a one-shot encounter.
These assumptions manifest themselves in the view that disputants are most
concerned with control as they assess the fairness of procedures. According
to
Thibaut and Walker, disputants want control-either process control or decision
control-because they see control as instrumental to attaining the fair outcomes
they
desire. Process control is important to disputants, according to this line of
thought, because
it
assures that each party to the dispute can see to it that the
third party receives information on contributions and outcomes, and this in
turn
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
139
allows the third party to use equity rules to resolve the dispute fairly. Decision
control allows the disputant to accept only those decisions that he or she regards
as desirable. (Folger [I9771 introduced the term
voice
to describe procedural
qualities very similar to those termed
process control
by Thibaut and Walker.)
More recently, other procedural justice theorists have offered additional
control-oriented models. Brett
(1986),
for example, argues that decision control
is one of the most important elements of a fair dispute resolution procedure
because people wish to maintain a feeling of control over what will happen to
them once the dispute is resolved. Vidmar
(1990)
and Leventhal (1976) view
people as motivated primarily by the desire to obtain favorable outcomes. Ac-
cording to both of these theorists, decision control is valued because
it
allows
unfavorable outcomes to be rejected, and process control is valued because
it
allows one to persuade the third party to rule
in
one's favor.
Some theories of procedural justice go beyond perceptions of control and
discuss other factors that might drive procedural justice judgments but that are
nonetheless instrumental, because procedures are viewed as means to achieve
goals outside the encounter with the procedure. For example, Leventhal (1980)
identified six potentially important procedural justice rules
in
outcome allocation
contexts: consistency, bias suppression, accuracy, correctability, representa-
tiveness, and ethicality. The consistency rule says that allocation procedures
should be applied consistently across people and over time. The bias suppression
rule says that personal self-interest and blind allegiance to narrow preconceptions
should be prevented. The accuracy rule says that decisions must be based as
much as possible
on
good information and informed opinion. The correctability
rule says that opportunities must exist to modify and reverse decisions. The
representativeness rule says that the allocation process must represent the con-
cerns of all important subgroups and individuals. Finally, the ethicality rule says
that the allocation process must
be
compatible with prevailing moral and ethical
standards. These six rules are important, according to Leventhal, because each
increases the likelihood that the final allocation will advance group goals.
The one common theme
in
all instrumental analyses is that procedures are
ultimately judged not
in
terms of their own qualities but rather in terms of their
implications for outcomes or for external relationships.
In
the final analysis,
according to instrumental models of procedural justice,
it
is not anything about
the social process mandated by a procedure that makes it fair. What matters is
whether the procedure serves some external goal.
2.
A
Relational Model
of
Procedural
Justice
Not all psychologists have accepted the proposition that concerns about justice
flow from instrumental motives. We have proposed a group-value model
of
procedural justice (Lind
&
vier,
1988)
that suggests that procedures are evalu-
140
TOM
R. TYLER AND
E.
ALLAN LIND
ated
in
terms of their implications for group values and for what they seem to say
about how one is viewed by the group using the procedures. The group-value
model hypothesizes that in reacting to procedures people are primarily concerned
about their long-term social relationship to the authorities
or
institutions that
employ the procedures (Lind
&
Earley, in press; Lind
&
Qler,
1988;
Qler,
1989;
Qler
&
Schuller,
1990).
Procedural justice depends, we argue, on the implica-
tions of the procedure for feelings of self-worth and for the belief that the group
is functioning properly and fairly.
l3
The group-value model asserts that people are sensitive to procedural nuances
because procedures are viewed
as
manifestations of basic process values
in
the
group, organization,
or
institution using the procedure. Because procedures ac-
quire substantial significance as symbols of group values, individuals
are
con-
cerned as much
or
more with what happens within the procedure as with whether
the
procedure promotes the attainment of some extraprocedural goal. Of key
importance, according to this analysis, are the implications of the procedure for
one's relationship with the group
or
authority that enacts the procedure.
To
the
extent that a procedure is seen as indicating a positive, full-status relationship, it
is
judged to be fair, and to the extent that a procedure appears
to
imply that one's
relationship with the authority
or
institution is negative
or
that one occupies a
low-status position, the procedure is viewed as unfair.
Because the group-value model predicts that people consider a procedure's
implications for their relationship with authorities as they form procedural justice
judgments,
it
is reasonable to ask which particular aspects of the authority-
perceiver relationship might be most important for perceptions of procedural
justice. Basing his analyses on group-value theory (Lind
&
Qler,
1988,
pp.
221-
242),
Qler
(1989)
has identified three factors-standing, neutrality, and trust-
that are especially important for the judgment that procedures are fair. All three
factors have to do with the relationship of the perceiver to the authorities using
the procedure.
l4
A
basic tenet of the group-value model is that people are predisposed to belong
to social groups and that they are very attentive to signs and symbols that
W~ere is an alternative to either an instrumental
or
a relational model of procedural justice. One
might posit that concerns about justice
are
intrinsic. Lemer
(1982),
for example, suggests that
"deservingness and justice" are independent motives underlying social behavior. Lerner
(1980)
has
demonstrated the existence
of
such basic motives by showing that they lead people to distort their
judgments about the world. Lerner
(1980,
1981)
talks about justice
as
an
intrinsic feature
of
our
reactions to others.
14The three relational factors-trust. standing, and neutrality-are theoretically distinct, but we
make
no
claim that they
are
phenomenologically distinct. That is, it makes sense to distinguish
among the three factors in theoretical discussions, but it may well
be
the case that most people simply
lump all
of
these concerns together as they assess the overall quality
of
their relationship with
an
authority.
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
141
communicate information about their status within their groups.
15
People want to
understand, maintain, and improve the social bonds that exist within groups.
Research shows that people establish social connections
if
given even the most
tenuous basis
for
group identification (Brewer
&
Kramer, 1986; Kramer
&
Brewer, 1984; Messick
&
Brewer, 1983; Tajfel, 1981; Tajfel
&
Turner, 1979;
Turner, 1987). One reason that people seek group membership is that groups
provide a source of self-validation (Festinger, 1954), giving their members infor-
mation about the propriety of their behavior, attitudes, and values. People are
concerned about their status in groups because high status within a valued group
validates their own self-identity. Hence, an important prediction of the group-
value model is that people value procedural indications that they have positive
stunding
within valued groups.
Information about standing-i.e., status recognition-is often communicated
to people by the interpersonal quality of their treatment by those in a position of
authority. In particular, when one is treated politely and with dignity and when
respect is shown
for
one’s rights and opinions, feelings of positive social stand-
ing are enhanced (Bies
&
Moag, 1986; Lind, MacCoun et al., 1990; Lind
&
Qler, 1988; Tyler
&
Bies, 1990). On the other hand, undignified, disrespectful,
or
impolite treatment by an authority carries the implication that one is not a
full
member of the group, and this is very threatening indeed (MacCoun
et
a]., 1988,
p.
54).
Lind, MacCoun et al. (1990) refer
to
these issues as dignitary concerns
and to the quality of procedures that meet these concerns as dignitary process.
Another feature-respect for one’s rights-is also hypothesized to be a particu-
larly potent indicator of one’s standing
in
a group
or
society.
Group-value theory assumes that people base their self-identity on their mem-
bership
in
valued groups. People find evidence that they are accepted members of
social groups rewarding and are troubled by evidence that they may be rejected
or
excluded from the group (Cartwright
&
Zander, 1953; Schachter, 1951). With
these concerns
in
mind,
vier
(1989) suggests that two other types of relational
concerns affect procedural justice judgments: the
neurrulify
of the decision-
maker and
trust
in the third party.
When considering whether an authority is displaying neutrality, people focus
on whether the third party creates a “level playing field” by engaging in even-
handed treatment of all involved. According to Tyler, neutrality involves honesty
and lack
of
bias. Neutral decision-making also uses facts, not opinions, in an
effort to produce decisions
of
objectively high quality.
Our
analysis of the impor-
tance of judgments of neutrality for procedural justice differs from more instru-
mental analyses, such as that offered by Leventhal (1980), that also emphasize
‘5By
srurus
we mean the person’s perception that he
or
she is valued by the group.
We
do not mean
simply wealth
or
prestige,
but
rather something more like approbation
and
acceptance by the group as
a
full
member with all rights associated with membership.
142
TOM R. TYLER AND
E.
ALLAN LIND
neutrality. We view the perception of neutrality of the authority as a concern in
and of itself, because neutrality
is
a critical quality of the person's relationship
with the authority, whereas instrumental analyses view neutrality as a quality that
is desired only because it leads to other goals.16
Perhaps the most potent manifestation of neutrality concerns is seen in the
belief that one has been discriminated against, that the authority is prejudiced
against members
of
one's subgroup. Quite apart from the suggestion that one will
receive less benefit from group membership, prejudice implies that one is some-
how less worthy than those who receive more favored treatment, and this im-
plication has extremely powerful consequences for feelings
of
self-worth.
Tyler's third relational factor is the extent to which the authority is seen as
trustworthy, i.e., whether the person believes that the authority can be trusted to
try
to behave fairly. Trust involves beliefs about the intentions of the authority.
As
is the case with standing and neutrality, the key element in concerns about
trust has to do with qualities of the authority and the perceiver-authority rela-
tionship, not with the effects of the authority's decision on factors external to the
procedural experience. Measures of trustworthiness generally include ratings of
the extent to which the authority is trying to be fair and ratings of whether the
authority is ethical. Tyler argues that inferences of trustworthiness are especially
important because they have implications for the future behavior of that authority
and the behavior of other, similar, authorities, and these implications in turn
suggest what the perceiver can expect across the whole range and duration of his
or her interactions with the group.
The relational model shares some elements with other social psychological
theories. Like the social identity and self-categorization models of Tajfel and
16This difference in emphasis leads to different predictions. As explained below, if the instrumen-
tal theorists are correct, neutrality should be a less powerful predictor of procedural justice judgments
than are external goals of the encounter with the authority, such as a fair distribution
or
maintenance
of good relations with other recipients of the distribution. According to
our
analysis, on the other
hand, external considerations should play a less important role than neutrality in determining whether
a procedure seems fair.
"The distinction between the behavior of an authority (e.g., that the behavior is neutral
or
ethical)
and inferences about the authority's motives
(e.g.,
that the authority is trying
to
be
fair) is important.
This distinction underlies, of course, attribution theories (Heider,
1958),
which recognize that people
often try to use behavior to infer hidden, unobservable character dispositions. On
a
practical level,
recognition of the importance of inferences about motives can be seen in people's comments about
their experiences when dealing with police officers and judges. In preliminary interviews concerning
encounters with police and judges,
Qler
(1990)
found that people often commented that the legal
authority in question had been wrong
or
dishonest, had shown bias,
or
had behaved improperly.
Nonetheless, the interviewees sometimes expressed satisfaction with the encounter and said they had
been treated fairly. Why? Because they believed that the authorities were motivated by a desire to
treat them fairly. It appeared that the inferred motivation could outweigh the behavior itself in
determining how the encounter was evaluated.
AUTHORITY IN
GROUPS
143
Turner (Tajfel, 1981; Tajfel
&
Timer, 1979; Turner, 1987),
our
model begins with
the premise that people are interested
in
learning about their own social identity
through their groups. Unlike Tajfel and lbrner, though, we focus
on
the search
for information about one’s position
within
one’s group, rather than
on
the
position of one’s ingroup vis-A-vis other groups. The reason that people are
so
interested
in
trust, standing, and neutrality, we would argue, is that they believe
that these factors tell them something about whether they will be treated fairly
and whether they are valued by the group using the procedure. This difference in
focus between
our
model and the Tajfel and Turner model is perhaps a natural
result of the types of groups each of
us
has studied. Tajfel and Turner have used
minimal laboratory groups to study the relationship between self-identity and
group membership, whereas we have focused
our
research
on
hierarchical organi-
zations.
3.
Implications
of
the Models
Because both types of models outlined above, instrumental and relational, are
attempting to explain the basic processes that underlie procedural justice phe-
nomena, they often overlap with respect to predicted relationships among vari-
ables, although they differ
in
how they explain these relationships and in their
hypotheses concerning the relative strength of various effects. Consider, for
example, five variables that have often been found to affect procedural justice
judgments: outcome favorability, control, neutrality, trust, and standing. Instru-
mental theories predict that outcome favorability and control are powerful deter-
minants of whether a procedure is seen as fair, because favorable decisions,
or
at
least control over decisions, are precisely what people want from procedures.
Instrumental theories predict weaker effects for neutrality, trust, and standing
because these three variables have to do with relationships within the procedure
and are therefore important only insofar as they suggest that the procedure can be
used to achieve external goals. But instrumental theories can account for indirect
causal links between relational factors and procedural justice: Symbols of
positive standing can imply high status within a group, and high-status members
typically have better outcomes; trust implies that one might at least receive some
fair outcomes; and neutrality implies that bias will not prevent one from receiv-
ing favorable outcomes.
In
contrast, relational models predict that factors that have to do with rela-
tionships within the procedure-judgments of neutrality, trust, and dignity-
have stronger effects than do factors that have to do with concerns outside the
procedure. Relational models can explain control and outcome favorability ef-
fects, however. Feelings of control can both result from and contribute to percep-
tions that one has standing within the group (Lind
&
Qler, 1988, pp.
236-237;
see also Lind et al., 1990). Similarly, favorable outcomes have informational, as
144
TOM
R.
TYLER AND E. ALLAN LIND
well as hedonic, value: A favorable decision can be taken as a sign of personal
worth and favor on the part of the powers that be and therefore can lead to greater
trust and greater perceived standing (Conlon, Lind
&
Lissak,
1989).
Factors that
seem at first glance to be purely instrumental might nonetheless affect procedural
justice judgments by virtue of their relational implications.
Thus
neither class of models predicts many effects that cannot be explained at
all by the other. In addition, it may well be the case that procedural justice
depends on both instrumental and relational considerations (see, e.g., Lind et al.,
1990).
The critical question is really how much each set of considerations con-
tributes to procedural justice and through procedural justice to compliance with
authority. To the extent, then, that the research literature supports one model of
procedural justice over the other, the support must turn on questions of the
relative magnitude of effects.
If
relational concerns account for the bulk of the
variation
in
procedural justice judgments, and control and outcome concerns
account for less variance, this suggests that the field should give less weight to
instrumental models and more weight to relational models
of
justice and au-
thority.
B.
RESEARCH
ON
PROCEDURAL JUSTICE
We turn now
to
a consideration of some research on the factors that affect
judgments
of
procedural justice.
I.
Research on Control Issues
Much of the procedural justice research conducted since the publication of the
Thibaut and Walker book
(1975)
has focused on the effects of various procedures
on the distribution of process control and the effects of process control on
judgments of procedural fairness (see Lind
&
Qler,
1988,
for a review).
A
large
number
of
studies support the Thibaut and Walker finding that the distribution of
process control influences assessments
of
procedural justice: Vesting process
control (or
voice,
to use Folger’s,
1977,
term) in the hands of those affected by a
decision leads to higher procedural fairness judgments (see, e.g., Folger,
1977;
Kanfer et al.,
1987;
LaTour,
1978;
Lind et al.,
1980;
Lind, Lissak,
&
Conlon,
1983;
Vler,
1987;
Tyler, Rasinski,
&
Spodick,
1985;
Walker, LaTour, Lind,
&
Thibaut,
1974).
Indeed, the process control effect is probably the most widely
replicated finding in procedural justice research. In that respect, Thibaut and
Walker’s control theory has been widely confirmed.
A
description of only one
of
the many studies confirming the process control
effect is sufficient to convey the nature of the effect. Kanfer et al.
(1987)
had
subjects
in
a laboratory experiment perform a task that involved generating a list
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
145
of innovative names
for
some common household products. The subjects were
told that the product names would be evaluated by a supervisor and that their
payment for the experiment would depend on how high a rating they received
from the supervisor. In the high-process-control condition, the subjects submit-
ted to the supervisor not only the product names, but also a written explanation of
why they felt the names were good. In the low-process-control condition, only
the names were given
to
the supervisor. The process control manipulation was
crossed with a manipulation of the outcome of the evaluation process: The
subjects were told that they had received either a high or a low evaluation. Table
IV
shows the mean ratings of procedural justice and the mean ratings of the
supervisor, averaging across the two outcome conditions. The high-process-
control procedure resulted in higher ratings of procedural justice and in higher
ratings of the supervisor.
As research on process control has accumulated, a number of findings have
emerged that cast some doubt on whether process control effects can be ex-
plained in the sort of instrumental terms used by Thibaut and Walker
(1
975)
and
other instrumental theorists. In their original analysis of control, Thibaut and
Walker placed their primary emphasis on decision control, viewing process con-
trol as an indirect means
of
exerting decision control. According to this analysis,
process control should exert less powerful effects on procedural justice judg-
ments than does decision control, because decision control allows one to act
directly to assure fair outcomes whereas process control allows only indirect
attempts to persuade the decision-maker to arrive at a fair decision. Contrary to
this prediction, subsequent research has shown that process control
is
frequently
more important to people than decision control (Lind et al.,
1983;
Tyler,
1987;
vier,
Rasinski,
&
Spodick,
1985).
In addition, a number
of
studies have shown
process control effects that defy instrumental explanations
of
the effect.
Lind et al.
(1983)
tested the relative effects of process and decision control on
procedural fairness judgments
in
a laboratory experiment on dispute resolution
procedures. The decision control manipulation involved the presence or absence
of an opportunity to reject the third-party decision on how the dispute should
be
resolved; the process control manipulation involved having or not having an
advocate
to
argue one's position to the third party prior to the decision. Thus,
TABLE
IV
PROCESS
CONTROL,
PROCEDURAL
JUSTICE,
AND
EVALUATIONS
OF
SUPERVISORSO
Measure High process control
Low
process control
Procedural justice judgments
Evaluation
of
suoervisor
6.30
6.10
5.00
5.20
~
'Values
are
mean ratings
on
%point
scales.
From
Kanfer.
Sawyer, Earley,
and
Lind
(1987)
146
TOM R. TYLER
AND
E.
ALLAN LIND
decision control was a more direct form of control over outcomes than was
process control, and
if
the instrumental view of the process control effect were
correct, decision control should have had greater effects on judgments of pro-
cedural fairness than did process control. Indeed, one might expect that process
control would have little effect on procedural fairness judgments when disputants
have decision control.
l8
The results of the Lind et al.
(1983)
study show that the decision control
manipulation had little effect
on
procedural fairness judgments (see Table V).
Process control enhanced disputants’ perceptions of the fairness of the procedure,
and
it
did so whether the disputant had decision control or not. These findings are
contrary to what one would expect if outcome instrumentality were the major
force underlying the process control effect; instead, the results suggest that there
is something about process control
in
and of itself that disputants like. The
findings run contrary to the instrumental idea that process control is simply a
poor surrogate for decision control.
qler, Rasinski, and Spodick
(1985)
used both survey and laboratory data to
test whether process control is related to procedural justice judgments in a fash-
ion that cannot be explained by its indirect effect on decision control. Data from
two survey studies, one involving defendant reactions to trial experiences and the
other involving student reactions to college courses, were subjected to hier-
archical regression analyses to determine whether judgments about process con-
trol correlated with procedural fairness judgments over and above any effect of
judgments about decision control. In both surveys an independent effect was
found for process control. In a third study, Tyler et al. manipulated the level of
process control, the level of decision control, and the allocation setting described
in
scenarios presented to their subjects. Again process control was found to have
independent effects on ratings of procedural fairness. In yet another set of survey
studies, Tyler
(1987)
replicated these findings.
Even stronger evidence that process control effects might involve something
other than instrumental considerations is provided by an experiment by Musante,
Gilbert, and Thibaut
(1983).
Musante et al. found that procedural justice judg-
ments are enhanced by an opportunity to express one’s views and opinions, even
when the expression of views is clearly not instrumental to obtaining favorable
outcomes. Musante et al. examined the effects
of
various types of participation in
the
design of procedures on judgments of the procedures’ fairness. Participants
were assembled into six-person groups. Some groups were asked to discuss and
decide on the rules to be used in a later adjudication that would affect the
participants’ outcomes. Other groups were told to discuss their preference for the
‘*In addition, the study included a manipulation
of
the outcome
of
the hearing: Participants were
told either that they had been awarded two thirds
of
the outcome in controversy
or
that they had been
awarded only one third
of
the outcome in controversy. The results presented
in
the table
are
averaged
across the two outcome conditions.
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
147
TABLE
V
PROCESS CONTROL, DECISION CONTROL,
AND
PROCEDURAL
JUSTICE^
High process control
Low
process control
High decision control
6.32
5.09
Low
decision control
6.17
5.35
“Values
are
mean ratings
on
9-poinI scales. From Lind, Lissak, and
Conlon
(1983).
various rules, but these groups were led to believe that their preferences would
have no effect on the rules actually used-participants
in
these groups were told
that the rules to be used had already been selected. In half of these discussion-
only groups the rules actually used matched the preferences expressed in the
group discussion;
in
the other groups in the discussion-only condition the rules
actually used did not match the group’s preferences. Finally, a set of control
groups were neither allowed to discuss nor to decide the rules to be used.
Table
VI
shows the results of the Musante et al. study. Participation in both
group discussion and decision-making led to the greatest enhancement of the
procedural fairness judgments, but group discussion alone also enhanced pro-
cedural fairness relative to the condition that involved neither discussion nor
decision-making
.
Lind et al. (1990) provide an even stronger demonstration of noninstrumental
process control effects. Lind et al. (1990) allowed participants in laboratory work
groups to voice their opinions about work goals either before or after the goal had
been assigned. In a “postdecision voice” condition, subjects were told that the
experimenter was interested in hearing what they had to say, but that the goal had
already been set and would not be changed. To emphasize the noninstrumental
nature of the process control, subjects
in
the postdecision voice condition were
told what the goal would be before they offered their comments and the same
goal was announced again after they had made their comments. The results of the
experiment, shown
in
Table
VII,
show that even postdecision voice enhances
judgments of the fairness of the procedures, as well as acceptance of the goal and
performance, relative to a no-discussion control group.
These findings support the hypothesis advanced by Tyler, Rasinski, and
Spodick (1985) that some process control effects may be due to favorable reac-
tions to the opportunity for expression rather than to any instrumentality of
process control
in
achieving good outcomes. In both the Musante et al. study and
the Lind et al. study an enhancement
of
fairness was observed in conditions that
are purely expressive, conditions
in
which there was no suggestion whatsoever of
control or influence over anything external to the procedure. Other research,
which has investigated the conditions
in
which the process control effect does not
occur, shows that at least part of the effect may turn on perceptions of one’s
relationship with the decision-making authority involved in the procedure. Spe-
148
TOM
R.
TYLER AND E. ALLAN LIND
TABLE
VI
CONTROL, DISCUSSION,
AND
PROCEDURAL
JUSTICE^
No control/ No controll
discussion discussion
No controll
(
preference
(
preference Control and
no discussion mismatched) matched) discussion
Procedural
-0.99
-0.56
0.28
1.28
justice
ratings
PHigher values indicate greater procedural justice. From Musante.
Gilbert.
and Thibaut
(1983).
cifically, several studies have shown that
it
is important that the decision-maker
be
seen as giving due consideration to the views expressed, even if he or she is
not influenced by those views (Conlon et al., 1989; Folger, 1977; Folger, Rosen-
field, Grove,
&
Corkran, 1979; Qler, 1987).
In two experimental studies, Folger and his colleagues have shown limitations
to the process control effect that suggest that the effect does not occur when the
basic fairness
of
the authority is very clear, or when the basic unfairness of the
authority is clear. Folger (1977) found that when the authority's interests are
opposed to those of the subject, and when the authority nonetheless makes
allocations that seem to be moving toward favoring the subject, the process
control effect disappears. In this experiment the subjects in the improving alloca-
tion conditions may well have decided that the allocator was trying to
be
fair, and
they may have been willing to trust the allocator even when they had no process
control: Folger et al. (1979) gave subjects independent information supporting
the inference that the authority was acting
unfairly,
and found that this too
diminished or obliterated the process control effect. In the Folger et al. study the
subjects may have concluded that the allocator could not be trusted
to
consider
their views under either process control condition and this belief could have
undermined the process control effect.
TABLE
VII
PROCEDURAL JUSTICE
AND
TIMING
OF
INPUP
Measure Mute (no voice) Postdecision voice Predecision voice
Procedural justice
2.43 3.15 3.70
Task performance
4.67 5.85
6.58
Acceptance
of
goal
4.33
5.67
5.93
"Values
for procedural justice are means
on
a 5-point scale; values for goal acceptance
m
means
on
IGpoint
scale; values
for
performance are number
of
units
completed. From Lind, Kanfer. and Earley
(1990).
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
149
Tyler
(1987)
used cross-sectional survey data to test four possible limitations
on the process control enhancement of procedural justice judgments. Tyler tested
whether the process control effect disappears when
(I)
the decision-maker is seen
as biased,
(2)
when the decision maker is seen as not acting in “good faith,”
(3)
when the decision maker is seen as not giving the disputant’s views due consider-
ation, and
(4)
when the outcomes involved were important. Each limitation was
tested by selecting individuals who did not believe they had any decision control
and who believed that the limitation in question was operative in their case.
Within each subset of individuals, the procedural fairness judgments
of
those
who reported high and low process control were compared. For example, to
examine the first limitation, Tyler tested the process control effect using only
survey respondents who believed the decision-maker was biased. The survey
showed that only the third limitation, the lack of due consideration, diminished
the process control effect. Perceptions
of
process control were associated with
enhanced procedural justice even when the decision-maker was seen as biased,
when he or she was seen as acting
in
bad faith, and when the outcomes were
important, but not when the decision-maker was seen as not giving consideration
to the respondent’s views and arguments.
A
laboratory experiment by Conlon et
al.
(1989)
also demonstrated the importance of belief that the authority is really
considering one’s views. Conlon et al. found that subjects who received un-
favorable outcomes but who believed their position had been considered give
higher
procedural justice ratings than do subjects who received better outcomes
but who believed that their position had not been considered.
In summary, then, there is considerable evidence that the process control effect
involves something beyond instrumental concerns. It appears that the opportunity
to express one’s opinions and arguments, the chance to tell one’s own side of the
story, is a potent factor
in
enhancing the experience of procedural justice, even
when the opportunity for expression really accomplishes nothing outside the
procedural relationship. Indeed,
it
is now clear that the opportunity to state one’s
case may be valued as much or more for its own sake as for its instrumental
influence on decisions. In addition, where limitations on the process control
effect have been found, the limitations occur when there are reasons to suspect
that the exercise of process control is thwarted by some more potent feature of the
perceiver’s relationship with the authority.
2.
Research
on
Noncontrol Issues
The group-value model of procedural justice suggests that people
are
con-
cerned about their long-term social relationship to groups and group authorities
(Lind
&
Tyler,
1988).
As
already noted, the group-value model and Tyler’s later
analyses of the potential procedural justice effects of relational concerns predict
that people will be concerned about issues
of
standing, neutrality, and trust.
150
TOM
R.
TYLER AND E. ALLAN LIND
51er has conducted two studies exploring relational concerns and their effects
on procedural justice in legal and managerial settings. In one study, Qler
(1988,
1989, 1990)
examined reactions to encounters with legal authorities, using inter-
views with people who had had recent personal experiences with police officers
or judges
(n
=
652).
In another study, Tyler and Schuller
(1990)
examined
people’s evaluations of their personal experiences with managers in their work-
place, using a sample of
409
workers who were asked about recent experiences
with their supervisors.
When interviewed about their experience, respondents in both studies were
asked to make a series of judgments about various elements of the procedures
used and various characteristics
of
the authority they had encountered. The
procedural elements studied corresponded to factors identified by Thibaut and
Walker
(1975;
process control, decision control), Lind and
vier
(1988;
neu-
trality, trust, standing), and Leventhal
(1980;
outcome favorability, consistency,
correctability). Judgments on these factors were then used as independent vari-
ables in regression equations predicting judgments of procedural justice. In addi-
tion, each of the factors was used to predict either ratings of legitimacy,
in
the
case
of
legal authorities,
or
a surrogate measure-organizational commitment-
in the case of managerial authorities.
Table
VIII
shows the results
of
the regression analyses. Several aspects
of
procedures make substantial independent contributions to judgments of pro-
cedural fairness. Significant regression weights are seen for outcome favorability,
control (process and decision control), neutrality, trust, and standing. In both
settings, however, the strongest determinants appear
to
be the relational mea-
sures. In the legal arena standing and trust are most important, while in the
managerial arena neutrality and trust are the most important. In both settings
TABLE
VIII
ATTRIBUTES ASSOCIATED
WITH
PROCEDURAL
FAIRNESSU
Attribute Legal authorities Managerial authorities
Control
.20**
.
I
o*
Outcome consistent with expectations
.oo
.03
Correctability
.02
-
.01
Neutrality
.13**
.21*
Standing
.29**
.11**
Outcome favorability
.14**
.lI**
Trust
.34**
.41**
A*
.68
.I5
‘‘Entries
are
standardized regression coefficients
for
an equation with
all
seven predictors. Control
=
process and
decision control; neutrality
=
honesty, competence. and lack
of
bias. From Qler
(1988);
Tyler and Schuller
(1990).
‘p
<
.01.
*‘p
<
,001.
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
151
outcome favorability and control show some independent relation to procedural
justice, but neither appears to account for a very large proportion of the variance
in procedural fairness.
It is possible to use the data from the Tyler (1988) and Tyler and Schuller
(1990) studies to assess more directly the explanatory power of the instrumental
and relational models.
A
series of regression equations were used to compare the
capacity of the factors specified by a given model to explain variance
in
pro-
cedural justice judgments that cannot
be
explained by the factors in the other
model,
or
by other judgments; we refer to this as the
unique
variance explained
by each set of variables. Table
IX
shows the degree to which each set of factors
can explain unique variance
in
procedural justice and legitimacy. The equations
compared relational factors to outcome favorability-the most instrumental of
instrumental factors-and to perceived control-a factor that previous research
and theory suggests might have both instrumental and relational connotations
(e.g., Lind et al., 1990; Lind
&
Tyler, 1988, pp.
236-237).
The results
of
this
analysis indicate that the relational variables dominate judgments about the fair-
ness of procedures.
As
would be expected from research showing how important
procedural justice is to legitimacy, these same relational factors also dominate
judgments of the legitimacy of the authorities. In the case of procedural justice
judgments concerning experiences with legal authorities, the relational factors
explain
24%
of the variance that cannot be explained by judgments
of
outcome
favorability and control, whereas outcome favorability or control explains only
TABLE
IX
PREDICTORS
OF
PROCEDURAL
JUSTICE
AND
LEGITIMACY~
Percentage of variance
Procedural justice Legitimacy
Alone Unique Atone Unique
Legal authorities
Outcome
Control
Relational factors
Total
Managerial authorities
Outcome
Control
Relational factors
Total
23
38
67
69
31
46
73
75
I
0
0
I
3
I
24
6
3
6
1
I1
2
1
9
0
25
16 6
18
'Entries are percentages
of
variance accounted for
by
each
set
of factors.
From
Sler
(1988);
Sler and Schuller
(1990).
152
TOM
R.
TYLER
AND
E.
ALLAN LIND
about
1%
of the variance not explained by relational factors. Findings in the
managerial arena are similar: Relational factors explain
25%
of unique variance
in judgments of procedural justice, and outcome favorability and control explain
0-2%.
An issue that arises with respect to findings like those of the nler
(1988)
and
51er and Schuller
(1990)
studies concerns the effects of outcome favorability on
procedural justice judgments, what Messick and Sentis
(1983)
refer to as ego-
centric biases
in
fairness (see also Vidmar,
1990).
It could be argued that at least
part of what drives procedural fairness judgments is simply
an
attempt to legit-
imize the desire for
good
outcomes. Thus, the link between compliance and
procedural justice, which we documented in the first section of this article, might
in reality simply reflect outcome effects on both procedural justice and com-
pliance. According to this line of argument, people want to conform to favorable
decisions, but they also want
to
appear to be acting fairly, rather than hedon-
ically. They therefore accentuate the fairness of the procedure that gave them a
good outcome and use the enhanced fairness to justify accepting an outcome that
they want.
The Tyler
(1988)
and
vier
and Schuller
(1990)
findings offer some informa-
tion on this possibility; their analyses suggest that the link between outcome and
procedural justice exists but that it is not very strong. The same conclusions are
suggested by the Lind
et
a].
(1991)
study mentioned
in
our discussion above of
the
effects of procedural justice
on
the acceptance of arbitration awards. Figure
3
shows the results of a structural equation analysis of a causal model with paths
linking relational concerns and outcome favorability to procedural justice. The
relational concerns measured in the study tapped whether there was adequate
opportunity to have the case heard by an impartial third party and whether fact-
based, rather then biased, procedures were used-perceptions relating to neu-
trality, trust, and standing. As can be seen from the figure, outcome favorability
did affect procedural justice judgments, and through its effect on procedural
justice outcome favorability had an indirect effect on the acceptance of arbitration
awards. Note, however, that the effect of relational concerns was more than
twice that of outcome favorability. The Lind et al. study also tested whether the
stakes in the case or the litigant’s involvement as an individual or as a corporate
actor affected the magnitude of the effects of relational concerns and outcome
favorability on procedural justice judgments. The results showed that the impact
of relational concerns on procedural justice was as strong for high-stakes cases as
for lower stakes cases and as strong for corporate executives as for people in
court as private individuals. The Lind et al. study also showed that the outcome
and relational effects were unaltered by the stakes in the case or by the litigant’s
role in case: there was no evidence that outcome was a more potent consideration
in high-stakes cases or for corporate litigants.
The experimental literature also offers some conclusions with respect to ego-
AUTHORITY
IN GROUPS
153
centric biases in procedural justice (see Lind
&
Tyler, 1988, pp. 110-112),
although
it
is difficult to compare the strength of outcome and relational effects in
experimental studies. In many experiments, outcomes have been found to affect
procedural justice judgments in ways that suggest an egocentric bias, but these
effects seldom obscure the effects of nonoutcome variables.
A
reasonable conclu-
sion from all the studies comparing outcome and relational effects is that, al-
though outcomes and relational factors both affect procedural justice judgments,
relational factors are the more powerful determinants of procedural justice judg-
ments. We
turn
now to additional research on each of the three relational factors.
Standing-concern about recognition of one’s status and mem-
bership in a valued group, organization,
or
society-leads people to examine
their encounters with authorities
for
evidence that they are being treated with
politeness and dignity and that their person and their rights are being respected.
A
number
of
studies confirm the importance attached to issues of politeness,
dignity, and respect in assessments
of
procedural justice.
Qler and Folger (1980) examined citizen-police contacts and found that one
key concern of citizens in such contacts was the “recognition of citizen rights’’
(p. 292).
In
two studies, Bies (1985; Bies
&
Moag, 1986) asked MBA job
candidates about what made a job interview fair
or
unfair. In both studies he
found that being dealt with respectfully was one
of
the most frequently cited
criteria of fairness. Another example of the positive effect of rights-affirming
behavior is provided by a study of people’s reactions to police responses to home
burglaries (Parks, 1976). In most burglaries there is little likelihood that the
police will recover the stolen property. Nonetheless,
if
the police come to the
home, take the problem seriously, and write out a report, evaluations of
the police do not decline following a burglary. Apparently, by reaffirming
people’s right to call on the authorities, the police create a positive experience
even when they cannot provide the desired outcome (recovering the stolen
goods).
Further evidence of the importance attached
to
issues of standing is provided
by the results of two recent studies
of
the civil justice system (Lind, MacCoun et
al., 1989, 1990; MacCoun et al., 1988). Tables
X
and
XI
show some of the
findings of these studies. The Lind, MacCoun et al. study examined the reactions
of litigants in personal injury cases to their litigation experiences. The litigants’
ratings
of
procedural justice were found to be rather strongly correlated with their
judgments
of
the dignity of a procedure
(r
=
.44).
Measures of procedural
desirability-the cost and delay associated with the procedure-showed little
correlation with procedural justice judgments, nor was there any significant
correlation between procedural justice and the amount of money won
or
lost in
the case. In addition, Lind, MacCoun et al. found that litigants thought that
adjudicatory procedures such as trial
or
arbitration were fairer than settlement-
oriented procedures such as negotiation
or
mediation. Structural equation analy-
a.
Srunding.
154
TOM R. TYLER AND E. ALLAN LIND
TABLE X
CORRELATES
OF
PROCEDURAL
JUSTICE
JUDGMENTS~
r
P
Objective measures
Outcome of case
Cost of litigation
Case duration
Subjective measures
Outcome relative to expectation
Cost relative to expectation
Delay relative to expectation
Decision and process control
Procedural dignity
Procedure careful
-
.04
-
.07
-
.07
.47*
*
-
.08
-.19**
.38**
.44**
.52**
.01
-.01
-
.08
.32**
-
.03
-
.08
.21*
.22*
.25*
.48
“Values are Pearson and polychoric correlations and standardized regression co-
efficients. From Lind, MacCoun et al.
(1990).
*p
<
.Ol.
**p
<
,005.
TABLE XI
CORRELATES
OF
PROCEDURAL
JUSTICE
IN
ARBITRATION
HEARINGS~
Correlation with procedural justice
Outcome: $ won/lost
Perceived control
Decision control
Process control
Relational concerns
Standing
Dignity
Respect shown?
Ethical
Considered my
evidence
Trust
Neutrality
Bias
.09
.31**
.29**
.30**
.47**
.62**
.62**
.17*
aEntries are Pearson correlations. Data
from
MacCoun, Lind, Hensler. Bryant,
and Ebener
(1988).
*p
<
.Ol.
‘*p
<
,001.
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
155
ses showed that this preference was due to the perception that the adjudicatory
procedures were more dignified than the settlement-oriented procedures. In the
MacCoun et al. study procedural justice ratings showed substantial correlations
with two measures linked to standing concerns: judgments that the disputants
were treated with respect
(r
=
.47) and with dignity
(r
=
.30).
We can use the Tyler (1988) data to examine the relative strength of two
components of standing: politeness and respect for rights. If we do
so,
we find
that both aspects of standing are important. Ratings of respect for rights show
slightly stronger correlations with procedural justice than do ratings of politeness
in both legal
(r
=
.54 vs.
r
=
.49) and organizational settings
(r
=
.71 vs.
r
=
.63),
but the correlations are not significantly different. The data from the Mac-
Coun et al. study also suggest that respect might be a more important factor in
standing than is the judgment that the procedure treats people with dignity.
Concern about authorities’ intentions leads people to examine their
encounters with authorities for evidence of trustworthiness, i.e., to look for signs
of ethical behavior, an intention to act fairly, and benevolence. These concerns
reflect a desire by group members to understand the stable, underlying moti-
vations of authorities, motivations that allow the authority’s future behavior to be
predicted. Trust depends on people’s efforts
to
predict how the authorities will act
in
the future.
Survey research on beliefs about authorities gives some clues about the psy-
chology of trust in authorities. When asked
in
the abstract how legal and political
authorities would treat them
if
they had dealings with the authority, people
almost always say that if they were to deal with a given authority in the future,
they would receive fair treatment (Tyler, 1990). This expectation exists despite a
widespread belief that injustice often occurs when citizens deal with the police
and courts. When asked what generally happens when people in general deal
with authority figures, survey respondents say that many people are treated
unfairly. This discrepancy between the belief that injustice occurs and the belief
that one is oneself invulnerable to the same injustice suggests the presence of an
“illusion of personal justice” analogous to illusions of personal control.
l9
Other research also demonstrates the existence of an illusion of personal
justice by showing that there is a gap between beliefs about justice on personal
and societal levels. Crosby (1984a, 1984b) has found that women workers often
recognize the existence of sex discrimination but nonetheless believe that they
b.
Trust.
IgBecause of this illusion
of
personal justice, people approach interactions with authorities with
the expectation that they will
be
treated fairly. Ironically, this may place the authority in a no-win
situation vis-8-vis those they govern.
If
the authority acts fairly, this might not have much influence
on the attitudes of those affected by the decision, since they expect fairness. Only disconfirming,
negative, experiences shape attitudes (Katz, Gutek, Kahn,
&
Barton,
1975).
Hence,
over
the course
of repeated encounters with authorities, people’s views
of
authorities should become
more
negative.
156
TOM R. TYLER AND
E.
ALLAN LIND
are not themselves the victims of discrimination. Similar findings have emerged
from studies of racial and ethnic discrimination (Crosby
&
Nagata, 1990; Taylor,
Wright, Moghaddam,
&
Lalonde, 1990). Crosby and Nagata argue that this gap
reflects a desire for “comfortable ignorance” or distancing. By feeling removed
from discrimination, people need not feel personally hurt by it.
There are two potentially distinct issues in the illusion
of
personal justice.
First, there is the possibility that the illusion grows out of the interpretation
of
one’s present situation.
A
person might know that discrimination exists but
believe that he or she is not currently a victim (Crosby, 1984a, 1984b). Careful
selection of comparison to others might allow one to think that one has escaped
discrimination. Second, there
is
the possibility that what is happening is an
overly optimistic assessment of future risks of discrimination (Qler, 1984).
Whatever current injustice exists for oneself and others, the illusion of personal
justice might lead one to believe that in the future one will be treated fairly.
Some early social psychological research shows that people place inordinate
trust in the benevolence
of
authorities. Pepitone (1950) demonstrated that people
exaggerate
the
benevolence of authorities who have power over them and exag-
gerate the power
of
authorities they believe to be benevolently disposed toward
them. Pepitone coined the term
facilitative distortion
to describe the phe-
nomenon.
What factors are most closely related to the judgment that an authority is
trustworthy? Table
XI1
shows some correlations based on the Qler (1990) and
Tyler and Schuller (1990) studies. Judgments
of
the authority’s ethicality appear
TABLE
XI1
PROCEDURAL
JUSTICE
AND
FACTORS RELATED
TO
TRUW
Management Law
Competence
How hard did authority try to.
. .
Solve problem?
Find satisfactory solution?
Prevent future problems?
Reduce anger?
Ethicality
How hard did authority try
to.
. .
Consider your views?
Explain decision?
Be fair to you?
Take account
of
your needs?
.54
.62
.35
.
I6
.71
.48
.76
.73
,666
.52
.31
-
.68
.71
-
-
“Entries in table
are
Pearson
correlations between factor
and
procedural
justice.
From
QIer
(1990);
Qler
and
bAsked
only
of
those who called
the
police.
Schuler
(1990).
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
157
to be more strongly related to procedural justice judgments than do judgments of
his
or
her competence. In the mediation study by Pruitt et al.
(1990),
which we
described earlier, the procedural fairness of mediation sessions was correlated
with
perceptions of the mediator’s empathy (r
=
.26).
To
the extent that people need the security of believing that they will receive
fair treatment, they are likely to be particularly sensitive to any apparent discon-
firmation of this belief
in
the actions of an authority. When people encounter
authorities their belief
in
personal justice is being put to the test.
A
laboratory
experiment by Lind and Lissak
(1985)
shows how unethical behavior by an
authority can violate expectations and change procedural justice judgments.
Lind and Lissak exposed subjects to a high-process-control trial procedure. In
one condition the judge acted
in
an unethical fashion, showing that he had a prior
friendship with the lawyer representing the subject’s opponent and joking with
the lawyer prior to the trial; in another condition the judge showed no sign of
knowing any of the parties
or
their lawyers and treated everyone in a purely
professional fashion. This manipulation was crossed with a manipulation of the
outcome of the trial: some subjects were told they had won the dispute and some
were told they had lost.
Table
XI11
shows the procedural justice ratings that subjects gave in each of the
four conditions. When there was no suggestion that the authority was acting
improperly, the outcome of the case had little effect on judgments
of
procedural
justice. On the other hand, when there was a suggestion of impropriety, a nega-
tive outcome diminished perceived fairness and a positive outcome enhanced
perceived fairness. Lind and Lissak explain their findings by suggesting that
people expect procedures to be enacted ethically and with neutrality, and the
unexpected appearance of impropriety led to a more intensive cognitive analysis
of the procedure than occurred without the impropriety. The more intensive
cognitive analysis led the subjects in the impropriety-present conditions to Look
to the outcome for information on the fairness of the procedure.
People are concerned with the neutrality of authorities because
evidence of bias or discrimination can constitute a powerful threat to one’s self-
image. Evidence of fundamental dishonesty or incompetence can threaten the
c.
Neutrality.
TABLE
XI11
UNETHICAL BEHAVIOR
AND
PROCEDURAL
JUSTICE
JUDGMENTSO
Judge ethical Judge unethical
Favorable outcome
6.28
Unfavorable outcome
5.89 6.85
5.26
“Higher values indicate higer procedural justice ratings.
From
Lind and
Lissak
(1985).
158
TOM R. TYLER AND E. ALLAN LIND
TABLE
XIV
PROCEDURAL
JUSTICE
AND
FACTORS
RELATED
TO
NEUTRALITP
Management Law
Consistency
of
outcomes
With expectations
.31
.54
With others
.21
.36
Lack of bias
.I9
.43
Honesty
.61
.53
Competence
.68
.37
"Entries
in
table are Peanon correlations between factor and pro-
cedural justice measure. From Sler
(1990);
Tyler and Schuller
(1990).
basic assumptions
of
the authority social system, negating the assumption that
those
in
power will behave in a reasonable, predictable fashion. Table
XIV
compares several factors relating to neutrality in terms of their correlation with
procedural justice. Interestingly, in legal settings, consistency, honesty, and bias
appear to be most important, while in work settings, honesty and competence
seem to be most important.
3.
Relational Concerns and Value
to
the Group
The assumption underlying this discussion has been that standing, trust, and
neutrality affect people because these factors communicate information about the
fundamental fairness of social processes in the group and because fairness of
treatment, in turn, is taken to indicate the person's value to the group (see Fig.
520).
Indeed, the group value that we were most concerned with in
our
original
group-value theory (Lind
&
Tyler,
1988,
chap.
10)
is the perception that one is
valued by the group. We have argued here that a
good
relationship with au-
thorities promotes feelings
of
procedural fairness and that this in turn leads one to
feel valued by the group. This group-value belief is, in turn, a potent determinant
of various attitudes and behaviors, including judgments of legitimacy and obe-
dience to authority.
Tyler and Schuller
(1990)
gathered data relevant to this assumption by examin-
ing the relationship between judgments about control, standing, trust, and neu-
trality during a recent personal experience with an authority and ratings
of
how
much the respondent felt the group valued him or her. The results
of
this analy-
sis, shown in Table
XV,
indicate that all three relational measures influence
2OFigure
5
does not contain an exhaustive listing
of
the components of
trust,
standing, and
neutrality. The figure
is
intended simply
to
illustrate the causal ordering we propose and
to
point out
the importance
of
fairness and value to the group as mediating variables in
our
model.
AUTHORITY IN GROUPS
159
\
Respect
/
for
Rights
Absence
of
Bias
or
Prejudice
Honesty
-Nartrdity
Fact--
Decision Making
Fig.
5.
A relational
model
of
authority.
perceptions of value to the group. Interestingly, measures of decision and process
control do not appear to account for much variance in feelings of status beyond
that explained by standing, trust, and neutrality.
If
process control affects feel-
ings
of
value to the group, as we have suggested (Lind
&
Qler,
1988),
it appears
to do
so
by virtue of its effects on judgments of standing, trust, and neutrality.
TABLE XV
PREDICTORS
OF
PROCEDURAL
JUSTICE
AND
PERCEIVED
VALUE
TO
GROUP'
Procedural justice Value
to
group
Process control .02
-
.03
Decision control
.14*
.05
Neutrality .31* .32*
Trust .42* .32*
Standing
.15*
.28*
R=
.78
.63
"Entries
are
standardized regression weights and squared multiple correlation
for
an equation containing all five predictors. From Tyler and Schuller
(1990).
*p
<
,001.
160
TOM
R.
TYLER AND
E.
ALLAN LIND
4.
lrnplications
The research reviewed above makes it clear that in arriving at judgments
of
procedural fairness people are not simply concerned with the settlement or deci-
sion that results from their encounter with authorities. People also care about the
implications of their experience with authorities for their understanding of the
group and their position
in
it. In fact,
it
is striking how much issues concerning
relationships to authority color the perception of justice. Relational concerns
seem to overwhelm concerns about the specific problem or dispute involved. In
the end,
it
appears, people do not approach an authority solely to resolve their
problem or dispute. Rather they view encounters with authorities as opportunities
to understand from the authority’s actions where they stand in the group and what
they can expect in future encounters with authorities.
Political scientists often regard the average person as having limited knowl-
edge about political events and a superficial and incoherent ideology about politi-
cal issues and problems. This image of the person emerges from the work of
Converse (1964)
on
beliefs among the mass public. In contrast, the findings we
have reviewed here suggest that people have complex and sophisticated criteria
that they use when evaluating decision-making procedures and the authorities
who
use the procedures (Tyler, 1988; Qler et al., 1989).
The complexity of people’s criteria for justice is demonstrated by the multiple
concerns affecting fairness judgments. The research described above shows that
in
both legal and managerial settings people respond to a variety of different
aspects of a procedure as they arrive at an assessment of its fairness. Other
studies, which have used open-ended response formats, have discovered still
other factors that are weighed
in
generating procedural fairness judgments (see
Sheppard
&
Lewicki, 1987).
It is interesting to compare the criteria discovered in psychological studies of
fairness judgments to those that underlie legal and philosophical codes of ethics
and fairness. Consider, for example, the United States government’s code of
ethics for the protection of human participants in behavioral and biomedical
research (Belmont Report, 1979). The Belmont code identifies three major
as-
pects of ethical treatment: respect for persons, beneficence, and justice. Respect
for persons involves issues of standing and control: “giving weight to au-
tonomous persons’ considered opinions and choices” (p. 23193) and not treat-
ing people solely as objects. Beneficence is concerned with issues of trust
in
the motives of authorities, with the scientist being evaluated on the extent to
which he or she is motivated to secure the well-being of those being studied.
Finally,
justice,
as used
in
the Belmont Report, mandates that studies be neutral
and nondiscriminatory and that they treat different classes
of
people consis-
tently.
Legal treatments of procedural rights have focused directly on issues that we
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
161
would label
stunding.*’
An example is the work of Mashaw (1985), which
articulates a dignitary theory of legal due process. Mashaw argues that legal
procedures should enact the basic values of American society. In particular, he
argues that procedures should include several characteristics linked to our most
basic conceptions of how the relationship between the individual and society
should be structured. Two of these characteristics reflect concerns that seem
closely linked to issues of standing in society: procedures should “contribute to a
participant’s sense of self-respect” (p.
175)
and they should protect people’s
privacy. Procedures must also be neutral and treat every person equally. Finally,
procedures must share control by providing opportunities for participation. Thus
in
Mashaw’s legal analysis, as in biomedical ethics, one finds many of the same
concerns that social psychologists have discovered in everyday justice judg-
ments.
Examination of these normative codes suggests that popular conceptions of
procedural justice in fact include the major elements of more formal ethical
codes. There may well be instances
in
which a lay application
or
counterbalanc-
ing of various concerns might fall short of that seen in legal
or
philosophical
analyses, but the picture that emerges from procedural justice research shows lay
judgments of procedural fairness to be rather more sophisticated than previously
thought.
The research we have described, and the relational model we propose, have
some interesting practical implications for leaders and followers. For leaders the
clear message is that approbation-official approval-is a much more powerful
tool than is generally thought. In organizational, legal, and political settings it is
common practice to use outcome incentives to secure obedience and compliance.
Our work suggests that this approach is likely to meet with limited success.
A
much more effective approach to leadership would involve making each follower
feel that he
or
she is important to the group. Stylistic considerations are as
important as substantive issues: politeness and expressions of concern for fol-
lowers’ needs will secure greater compliance than will cold outcome incentives.
Above all, the leader must be concerned with the appearance of fairness, with
convincing followers that he
or
she is willing to consider their point of view, and
that he
or
she will be even-handed and nondiscriminatory in decision-making.
Greenberg
(
1990b) offers an excellent analysis of the management of fairness
impressions. His conclusions and suggestions are quite similar to those offered
here.
This advice runs counter to some popular notions of leadership. Many in
positions of authority feel that to allow subordinates to express their views might
2llt is important not
to
confuse what we have chosen
to
label
srunding
(concern about one’s
membership and status in a group, organization,
or
society) with what the laws calls
srunding
(the
right to
be
involved in the suit in question).
As
is the case with social psychological and legal
uses
of
the term
eyuiry,
the same term can mean quite different things in the two disciplines.
162
TOM R. TYLER AND E. ALLAN LIND
be seen as a sign of weakness
or
might build unreasonable expectations.
Our
work and that of other theorists and researchers suggest that nothing could be
further from the truth. It is precisely by showing concern for followers that a
leader can gain the greatest effective power
in
shaping their behavior.
Bies and colleagues (Bies, 1985; Bies
&
Shapiro, 1987; Bies, Shapiro,
&
Cummings, 1988; Tyler
&
Bies, 1990) point out the importance of accounts or
explanations in situations
in
which leaders act in ways that appear to violate
norms of procedural fairness. Such accounts serve, we would argue, to amelio-
rate feelings of injustice by working on subordinates’ judgments of standing,
neutrality, and trust. By attending to these essential elements of procedural
justice, either directly by enacting behaviors that promote them
or
indirectly by
explaining away procedural improprieties, leaders can enhance their legitimacy
and encourage compliance with their directives.
For followers, the principal message
of
our
work is a caution. The relational
model argues that authority turns on factors that are subjective and stylistic in
nature. This raises a problem of what is often termedfulse consciousness
(Co-
hen, 1985; Lind
&
Tyler, 1988, pp. 201-202) or
hollow
justice (Greenberg,
1990b). Followers have to be on guard to protect against unscrupulous leaders
who offer a false image of concern for their welfare. Concern with relational
issues
in
reactions to authority is not illogical, as we note below, but
it
does leave
one open to exploitation by leaders who manipulate the effects we have described
above.
111.
Conclusions
The research and theory we have reviewed here have important implications
for our understanding of the psychology of authority and legitimate power, but
they also have implications that
go
well beyond the immediate topic of this
article. The findings we have outlined suggest a picture of social life that is at
variance with much recent research and theory on the psychology of groups. One
of the most intriguing aspects of this new picture of social life is the way in which
it
appears to intertwine research issues that have become separated as social
psychologists have allowed the field to be divided into social cognition and
group process camps. In this section we will consider briefly each
of
these
implications.
A. A RELATIONAL
MODEL
OF AUTHORITY
It is becoming increasingly clear that the key to authoritativeness and legiti-
macy lies not
in
judgments about the decisions
of
an authority, but rather in
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
163
judgments about the procedure, the process, and the quality of interaction that
characterize encounters with authority. In study after study, our research and that
of other psychologists has shown that the favorability of a decision or even the
fairness of the decision plays only a minor role in determining legitimacy. Much
more important,
it
appears, are judgments of the fairness of procedures. And
judgments of procedural fairness are based, in turn, on process-based inferences
about one’s relationship with the authority. The belief that the authority views
one as a full member of society, trust in the authority’s ethicality and benev-
olence, and belief in the authority’s neutrality-these appear to be the crucial
factors that lead to voluntary compliance with the directives of authority.
In a previous discussion of the finding that procedural justice is a powerful
determinant of evaluations of groups, organizations, and societies (Lind
&
Tyler,
1988, pp.
227-228),
we argued that procedures are more important than indi-
vidual outcomes because procedures endure across repeated encounters with the
group, whereas outcomes vary from encounter to encounter. For example, be-
cause students can expect to encounter much the same procedure every time they
take a test, it is really quite reasonable that they would be more sensitive to
unfairness
in
a testing procedure than to the outcome of any individual test. This
“repeated-exposure” explanation does not really work for reactions to au-
thorities, however. Some of the authority encounters studied in the research cited
above involve repeated interactions with the same authority, but many others do
not, and there is no evidence that the procedural justice-legitimacy effect is
restricted to the former. Consider, for example, the Lind et al. (1991) study that
found procedural justice to be a powerful determinant of the acceptance of
arbitration awards. It is very doubtful indeed that any of the litigants in that study
expected to ever submit another case to the same arbitrator or, for that matter, to
the same arbitration program. Why then should procedure matter
so
much if, like
outcomes, encounters with procedures are generally one-shot interactions?
One might argue that, even
if
one expects to never again confront the present
authority, one might nonetheless believe that other authorities would use the
same procedures, and that the emphasis on procedural issues might turn
on
this
belief. But this explanation runs afoul of the research on the factors that drive
judgments of procedural fairness. In the final analysis, qualities such as po-
liteness, even-handedness, and ethicality account for most of the variance in
procedural justice judgments, and these qualities have a distinctly personal quali-
ty. Indeed, as procedural justice research has advanced, the emphasis of the field
has moved from fairly objective qualities that are constant across many enact-
ments of the procedure-such as whether one has a lawyer to present one’s case
or whether one has the right to reject the decision-to qualities that are much
more personal and subjective.
Part
of the explanation of why people are
so
concerned with their relations
with
authorities can be found, we believe, in the ambivalence with which people
approach those in positions of authority. We noted at the beginning of this article
164
TOM
R.
TYLER
AND
E.
ALLAN LIND
that the empowerment of an authority differs from the institution of a law or rule
because the very nature of authority is the transfer of power from many to one. In
addition to the outcome dependence that accompanies such a transfer of power
(Thibaut
&
Kelley,
1959),
authorities are generally viewed as speaking for the
group: The authority is often the person who is the symbol of the group. Thus
authorities have power over other members both because they regulate important
outcomes and because their apparent assessment of group members is taken as
indicative of the assessment of that member by the entire group. Having given
the authority power over both their outcomes and their feelings of self-worth,
people are at once fearful that the authority will harm them and hopeful that the
authority will act to improve their situation or their self-image.
More clues to the puzzle of what makes authority relations
so
important lie in
the process by which people arrive at cognitions about social events and social
structures. We humans are social creatures, very much involved in and dependent
on the groups, organizations, and society to which we belong. But in many
instances, we never really see or interact with the group as a group. Instead, we
have occasional encounters with specific other members of the group, and we
are
left to draw what information we can from these encounters. Nonetheless we
need to understand how these nebulous, but extremely important, entities func-
tion, and we therefore engage in a rough inductive process, infemng what we
can about the group from the information we have.
To
this end, authorities
are
treated as though they were indeed representative, and we look to our treatment
by one authority
to
try to discover how other authorities, and the group as a
whole, view us.
This inductive inference process might also account for the importance of
relational factors in procedural justice judgments. Let us begin with the assump-
tion that there are no qualitatively distinctive authority-assessing processes. In-
stead, familiar social cognition processes come into play when people attempt to
decide whether to obey an authority. The only differences in reacting to authority
lie
in
the increased motivation to obtain information about how one is viewed and
a propensity to distort information resulting from the desire
to
have a positive
relationship with the authority.
When we meet another individual, we immediately begin making inferences
about what that person thinks of
us,
whether he or she is sincere, and whether he
or she harbors any bias against us. We do not wait to see whether the person will
make decisions that favor
us.
Instead, we look to the interaction process to arrive
at impressions about the person on various dimensions. If the person
is
rude, if
he or she appears to break the conventions that govern the interaction, or if he or
she shows some bias or prejudice against us, we respond negatively. If, on the
other hand, the person seems well-disposed toward us, if he or she seems to
respect our views, and if we find no evidence of prejudice or bias, we respond
favorably.
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
165
The research literature on legitimacy suggests that these same impression
formation processes are brought to bear on people’s reactions to authorities.
There may well
be
instances wherein the standards that one applies to an authori-
ty are different from those one would apply to an individual one met on purely
social grounds, but the data seem to suggest that the way impressions are
formed-by looking at the social process for information relevant to one’s rela-
tionship to the person-is similar. For interactions with authorities (and perhaps
for many other sorts
of
interactions), the impression dimensions of concern are
standing, trust, and neutrality, and the source of information about these factors
is the social process and the procedures that the authority uses. The rather
personal conclusions that are drawn with respect to the particular authority one
has encountered are then generalized to other authorities in the group. The only
differences lie in the particular motivational distortions that people bring to bear
on experiences with authorities. Because
it
is
so
important to people that they
have positive relationships with authorities, they approach encounters with au-
thorities with an illusion of personal justice and they interpret the authority’s
actions “through rose-colored glasses.”22
Outcomes and other instrumental concerns have little effect on impressions of
authorities, according to this line of analysis, because by the time information on
these factors are available, relatively strong impressions of the authority have
already been generated. When outcome information does arrive,
it
is interpreted
in
terms of already-existing beliefs about the authority, and thus it does not exert
as much influence as would otherwise be the case.
B. IMPLICATIONS
FOR
SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY
Whether or not the analysis just presented is an accurate explanation of the
process by which authorities come to be viewed as authoritative, the research
makes
it
clear that people are very much concerned with inferences about rela-
tional issues when they interact with authorities. Simple as this finding seems, it
reveals some interesting limitations
in
current thinking about both social cogni-
tion and group process.
We began this article with a question that seemed to belong very much to the
group process side
of
social psychology: How can a leader obtain voluntary
compliance from subordinates? Most
of
the references cited
in
the first pages of
this article were to classic group process research. But by the time we had
followed the question through the research literature, we were led to answers that
2% might
be
argued, however, that in this respect,
too,
ordinary social cognition processes are at
work. Positivity biases are well-documented, and we would predict that the illusion
of
personal
justice exists in interactions with nonauthorities as well as in interactions with authorities.
166
TOM
R.
TYLER AND E. ALLAN LIND
are essentially cognitive. Legitimacy, it seems, turns on cognitions concerning
how the authority has made his or her decision and these cognitions in turn
depend on attributions about the reasons for the authority’s behavior and
in-
ferences about the meaning of the social process of the encounter. As we re-
viewed the research literature it became clear that any attempt to explain legiti-
macy that is not cognitive runs into serious problems. Attempts to explain
legitimacy solely by reference to patterns of outcomes, for example, are simply
not supported by the data.23 The psychology
of
authority rests upon cognitions
about the authority, cognitions about the authority’s beliefs and motivations, and
most especially on cognitions about the relationship between the person and the
authority.
At the same time, however, the cognitive questions (and answers) we have
discovered are rather different from the questions that occupy the attention of
social cognition researchers. Specifically, the cognitions that underlie perceived
legitimacy are in a sense more social: They concern not just inferences about
another person but also, and indeed primarily, inferences about a relationship.
What matters most in legitimacy,
it
seems, are not what might be termedfirst-
order inferences, i.e., inferences about personal qualities of the authority such as
his
or
her competence or intelligence, but rather second-order inferences, i.e.,
inferences about the authority’s beliefs, biases, and cognitions concerning the
perceiver. These questions of “what he thinks of me” have certainly received
attention in previous work in social psychology-research on impression man-
agement focuses on just this issue-but they do not receive much attention in
current research and theory on social cognition.
An intriguing and almost contradictory picture of social behavior emerges
from the literature on legitimacy. Our analysis shows the person to be a very
social creature indeed, interested in various aspects of his or her relationship with
the authority
in
question-indeed, interested in these relational issues even more
than
in
his or her own outcomes from the authority’s decision. We see the person
also as an information processor: a very attentive and sophisticated assessor of
the tone and quality of social process, sifting through the authority’s behavior in
search of clues for relational inferences. But at the same time, this preoccupation
with relational inference, this sophisticated application
of
multiple criteria to
assessing first procedural justice and then from procedural justice determining
legitimacy, is subject to the same limitations and inconsistent heuristics that
characterize other social cognition processes. Above all, though, we see the
person as an entity that is at once social and individual: searching constantly for
information concerning his or her individual place in a social structure and trying
to understand the personal implications of his or her social world.
2%
the terminology
of
interdependence theory (Kelley
&
Thibaut,
1978),
this is
to
say that very
strong transformation processes are at
work
in the exercise
of
legitimate power.
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
167
IV. Appendix: Measures
of
Outcome Favorability,
Distributive Justice, Procedural Justice, Legitimacy,
and Related Variables"
ALEXANDER AND RUDERMAN, 1987
Outcome fairness
Pay fairness:
All in all, my pay is about what
it
ought to be.
My pay is fair considering what other places in this area pay.
My pay is fair compared
to
the pay of others in this agency.
My last annual performance appraisal rating was about what it ought to have been.
Performance appraisal fairness:
Fairness of decision-making procedures
Appeals procedure fairness:
The appeals procedures protect me from unfair treatment if a personnel action is
Appealing personnel actions is a waste of time.
The negotiated grievance procedures protect employees if they have a formal
When people perform poorly here they're given a chance to improve their work.
Generally speaking, annual performance appraisals are done fairly here.
brought against me.
personnel action against them for poor performance.
Performance appraisal fairness:
FOLGER AND
KONOVSKY,
1989
Outcome favorability
Raise as a percentage of salary.
Distributive justice
How fair do you consider the size of your raise to
be?
To what extent did your raise give you the full amount you deserved?
How did your raise compare to your expectations?
To what extent was the size of your raise related
to
your performance?
24This appendix contains the measures used in studies for which we
report
specific values and
statistics. In some instances it has been necessary to infer the wording of questions from published
reports.
TOM
R. TYLER
AND
E.
ALLAN LIND
Procedural justice
The supervisor
.
.
.
Was honest and ethical in dealing with you.
Gave you an opportunity to express your side.
Used consistent standards in evaluating your performance.
Considered your views regarding your performance.
Gave you feedback that helped you learn how well you were doing.
Was completely candid and frank with you.
Showed a real interest in trying to
be
fair.
Became thoroughly familiar with your performance.
Took into account factors beyond your control.
Got input from you before a recommendation.
Made clear what was expected of you.
Discussed plans
or
objectives to improve your performance.
Reviewed with you objectives for improvement.
Resolved difficulties about your duties and responsibilities.
Obtained accurate information about your performance.
Found out how well you thought you were doing your job.
Asked for your ideas on what you could do to improve company performance.
Helped you find out why you got the size of raise you did.
Let
you make an appeal about the size of your raise.
Allowed you to discuss how your performance was evaluated.
Helped you develop an action plan for future performance.
Frequently observed your performance.
Organizational commitment Cfrom Mowday, Steers,
&
Porter,
1979)
I
am willing to put in a great deal of effort beyond that normally expected in order to
I
talk up this organization
to
my friends as a great organization
to
work
for.
1
feel very little loyalty
to
this organization.
I
would accept almost any type of job assignment in order to keep working for this
I
find that my values and the organization’s values are very similar.
I
am
proud to tell others that
I
am part of this organization.
1
could just as well be working for a different organization as long as the type of work
This organization really inspires the very best in me in the way of job performance.
It
would take very little change in my present circumstances to cause me to leave this
I
am extremely glad that
I
chose this organization
to
work for over others
I
was
There’s not too much to
be
gained by sticking with this organization indefinitely.
Often,
1
find it difficult to agree with this organization’s policies on important matters
help this organization be successful.
organization.
was similar.
organization.
considering at the time
I
joined.
relating to its employees.
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
169
I
really care about the fate of this organization.
For
me this
is
the best of all possible organizations for which to work.
Deciding to work
for
this organization was a definite mistake
on
my part.
KANFER, SAWYER, EARLEY, AND LIND,
1987
Procedural justice
How fair is the procedure used
to
determine which company will receive the con-
How satisfied are you with the procedure used to evaluate your company’s
perfor-
tract?
mance?
Evaluation
of
supervisor
To
what extent do you consider the representative
to
be
an ally in your effort
to
win
How satisfied are you that the best arguments will
be
presented?
the contract?
LIND, KANFER, AND EARLEY,
1990
Acceptance
of
goal
How committed are you
to
attaining the goal assigned to you by the experimenter?
Procedural justice
How fair was the way the goal was set?
Task
performance
[Task units completed in time allotted.]
Control
How much control did you have over the goal that was set?
LIND, KULIK, AMBROSE, AND PARK,
1991
Relational process judgments
HOW much opportunity was there in your case to have the facts heard and decided by
an impartial third party?
170
TOM
R. TYLER
AND
E.
ALLAN
LIND
Would you say the procedures and rules that applied to your case were very effective,
moderately effective,
or
not effective at all in getting at the facts?
Would you say the procedures and rules that applied to your case were very effective,
moderately effective, or not effective at all in assuring that your case was decided
by a neutral party?
Outcome favorability judgments
Now I’d like to ask you a few questions about the final result of the lawsuit. Was the
final result of the case very favorable, somewhat favorable, somewhat unfavorable,
or
very unfavorable to you (your organization)?
Compared to what you expected when you entered the lawsuit, is the final result
of
the case more favorable to you (your organization), less favorable,
or
about what
you expected?
Procedural justice judgments
Overall, fair were the procedures and rules that applied to your case? Would you say
they were very fair, somewhat fair, somewhat unfair,
or
very unfair?
Would you say the procedures and rules that applied to your case were very effective,
moderately effective,
or
not effective at all in ensuring that both parties were
treated fairly?
Acceptance
of
awards
[Coded from
court
documents.
J
LIND AND LISSAK,
1985
Procedural justice
How satisfied were you with the dispute resolution procedure in which you partici-
How fair was the dispute resolution procedure in which you participated?
How satisfied are you with the procedure used in the dispute resolution?
How fair was the procedure used in the dispute resolution?
pated?
LIND, LISSAK, AND CONIDN, 1983
Procedural justice
How satisfied
are
you with the procedure used in the dispute resolution?
How fair was the procedure used in the dispute resolution?
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
171
LIND,
MAcCOUN
ET
AL.,
1989,
1990
Procedural justice
[Arbitration] At the time you went through it, how fair did you think the arbitration
[Judicial settlement conference] At the time the conference took place, how fair did
[Trial] At the time you went through it, how fair did you think the trial was?
[Settlement] At the time, how fair did
you
think the settle process was?
[All procedures] Finally, looking back, do you think the procedure that was used
for
resolving your dispute was very fair, somewhat fair, somewhat unfair,
or
very
unfair?
hearing was?
you think it was?
Dignity
of
procedure
Which word best describes your (hearing/settlement
conference/trial/expenence
[settlement])? Response options: Dignified, Undignified.
Case outcome
How did you feel about the final outcome-were you very satisfied, somewhat
satisfied, somewhat dissatisfied, very dissatisfied?
Cost
of
litigation
[Dollars spent on attorney fees and litigation expenses.]
Case duration
[Days from incident causing litigation to case termination.
1
Outcome relative
to
expectation
Compared to what you expected when the case was first filed, was the final outcome:
better than you expected, worse than
you
expected, just about what you expected?
Decision and process control
Outcome control. How much control did
you
feel you had over the outcome
of
your
case? Response options: A great deal, Some,
A
little, Not much.
Process control. Overall, thinking about your dealings with the court and with your
lawyer, how much control would
you
say you had over the way your case was
handled? Response options:
A
lot, Some,
A
little, Not much.
172
TOM
R.
TYLER AND E. ALLAN LIND
Procedure careful
Which word best describes your (hearinglsettlement
conference/trial/experience
Question
1
response options: Careful, Casual.
Question
2
response options: Superficial, Thorough.
[settlement condition])?
Cost relative to expectation
All things considered, do not think you got your money’s worth from your attorney?
Delay relative to expectation
Considering what had to
be
done, do you think the time it took for your case to get
resolved was very reasonable, somewhat reasonable, somewhat unreasonable, or
very unreasonable?
Did it take too much time to resolve the case
or
was there not enough time? [asked if
response to above was not “Very reasonable.”]
MAcCOUN, LIND, HENSLER, BRYANT,
AND EBENER,
1988
Procedural justice
The rules and procedures used in the hearing were fair.
In general, the arbitration hearing was fair.
All
things considered, what would have been the
fairest
way to decide this kind of
case? (Trial by judge; trial by jury; arbitration.)
Relational concerns
Standing
The arbitrator(s) treated me with respect.
The arbitration hearing was dignified.
The arbitrator@) were very ethical in their handling of this case.
The arbitrator(s) gave thorough consideration
to
all the evidence.
The arbitrator(s) showed favoritism toward one side.
Trust
Neutrality
Outcome favorability
Was the verdict in [your]/[the other side’s] favor?
According to the award designated by arbitrator(s), what is the total amount (includ-
ing attorney’s fees) you would receive or pay?
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
173
lntentions to acceptlreject award
Do
you think you will accept or reject the arbitration award?
You
had a choice to accept
or
reject the arbitrator(s) decision.
Outcome
Perceived decision control:
Perceived process control:
You
had some control over the decision of the arbitrator(s).
You
had some control over the way the arbitration hearing was conducted.
Your
lawyer had some control over the way the arbitration hearing was conducted.
MUSANTE, GILBERT, AND THIBAUT, 1983
Procedural justice lfactor scores with substantial
loadings
on
the following questions]
How satisfied are you with the procedure?
Do
you trust the procedure?
Is
the procedure fair?
Was the trial fair?
Are you satisfied with the trial?
Was the trial verdict an objective representation of the facts in the case?
Was the trial verdict fair?
Do you accept the verdict?
PRUITT, PEIRCE, McGILLICUDDY, WELTON,
AND CASTRIANO,
1990
Compliance with mediation
Did the other party live up to all the terms of agreement?
Procedural fairness
Was the mediation hearing fair?
Joint problem-solving
[Coded from behavior in mediation hearing.]
Perceptions
of
mediator empathy
[Measure not reported in paper.]
174
TOM
R.
TYLER AND
E.
ALLAN LIND
RASINSKI,
1988
Political activity related to specific government
benefits and services
Have you ever spoken to, written, or called
a
political official about government
Have you ever written
to
a newspaper, magazine, television, or radio station about
Have you ever attended a political meeting or demonstration concerning government
benefits
or
services?
government benefits
or
services?
benefits or services?
General political activity
Have
you
ever worked for a political candidate’s campaign?
Have you ever displayed political signs, bumper stickers,
or
worn political buttons
Have you ever donated money to a political campaign?
Have
you
ever tried to convince others who to vote for?
during an election period?
Procedural justice
How fair are the procedures government agencies use to decide which groups of
people will receive benefits. Are they very fair, somewhat fair, somewhat unfair,
or very unfair?
How often do you think the people in government consider the needs of all people
when they decide who to give government benefits to? Would you say always,
usually, sometimes, or never?
How often do you think the people in government consider the needs of you or your
family when they decide how much benefits you will receive? Would you say
always, usually, sometimes, or never?
Are the people in government usually impartial when they decide who will get
benefits
or
do you think they favor some groups over others?
Do
you think government agencies usually have enough information about your
needs when they make policies about benefits you will receive?
Do
you think government agencies usually have enough information about the needs
of all people when they make policies about benefits you will receive?
Do
you think government agencies usually have enough information about the needs
of all people when they make policies about which groups should get benefits?
Outcome favorability
As
you
know, we all receive some type of benefit from
the
government. For example,
the government maintains streets and parks and provides police and fire protec-
AUTHORITY IN GROUPS
175
tion. Public schooling is another benefit some people receive from the gov-
ernment. Some people even get special benefits like food stamps or social secu-
rity.
I
would like you to think about whatever benefits you receive from the
government.
Overall, how much do you benefit from the government?
Do
you get a great many
benefits, some benefits, a few benefits, or not many benefits at all?
Now
I
am going to read a list of government benefits.
For
each one could you tell me
whether you receive
it
now
or
received it any time in the past
or
never received it.
a. Social Security
b. Workmen’s compensation
c. Veteran’s benefits
d. Disability insurance
e. Unemployment compensation
f. AFDC. That is, aid to families with dependent children
g.
SSI.
That is, supplemental security income
h. General assistance. That is, locally provided public assistance to people not
i.
Low-interest loans such as for education or home improvement
j.
Government grants such as for education, job training, or home improvement
k.
Medicare
or
Medicaid
1.
Food stamps
m. Anything
I
haven’t mentioned?
Compared
to
3
years ago
(1980/1981)
do
you
receive the same amount of benefits
from the government, more benefits,
or
less benefits?
Now
I
am going to name some groups of people. Please tell me if you think
you
receive more government benefits than the group, the same amount of benefits,
or
fewer benefits than the group?
a.
Elderly people over
65
b. Poor people
c. People who
are
handicapped
d. Middle-income people
e. Unemployed people
f.
Rich people
g. Minorities
h. Sick people
eligible for public aid
Distributive fairness
Do
you feel that
you
receive as much benefit as you deserve
or
do you receive more
or
fewer benefits than you deserve?
In your opinion do elderly people get more than their fair share
of
benefits from the
government, less than their fair share of benefits,
or
do they get the benefits that
they deserve? (Repeat questions substituting each of the seven remaining groups
from above.)
I76
TOM
R.
TYLER AND E. ALLAN LIND
TYLER,
1984
Outcome favorability
What was the final disposition
of
your case? (Charges dismissed/found innocent;
found guilty, but sentence suspended; sentenced
to
serve supervised sentence;
finedlgiven probation/given suspended sentence).
Distributive justice
How fair was the outcome you received?
Procedural justice
How just and impartial were the procedures used by the judge in trying your case?
Legitimacy
How would you rate the performance of the judge in terms
of:
Overall performance
of
his duties
Courtesy
Honesty
Fairness
Overall, how fairly was your case handled?
How good a job do you think the courts are doing in handling cases such as yours?
TYLER, 1990
Outcome favorability
Calls
to
the police:
Stopped by the police:
Did the police solve the problem about which
you
called?
Did the police arrest you
or
take you to a police station?
Did the police cite you for a violation
of
the law?
How serious was the violation?
How pleased were
you
with the outcome
of
your case?
courts:
Distributive justice
How fair was the outcome
[of
your call]/[of your contact with the police]/[you
received in court]?
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
177
Did you feel that you received the outcome you deserved, a better outcome than you
deserved,
or
a worse outcome than you deserved?
Procedural justice
How fair were the procedures used [to handle your call]/[when you were
How fairly were you treated?
stopped]/[when you went to court]?
Legitimacy
I
have a great deal of respect for [the police/the courts].
On the whole, [police officers/judges] are honest.
I
feel proud of the [police/courts].
I
feel that
I
should support the [police/courts].
Court
decisions are almost always fair.
The basic rights of citizens are well protected in the courts.
People should obey the law even if it goes against what they think is right.
I
always try
to
follow the law even if
I
think it is wrong.
Disobeying the law is seldom justified.
It
is difficult to break the law and keep one’s self-respect.
A
person who refused to obey the law is a menace to society.
Process control during the experience
How much opportunity were
you
given to describe your problem before any deci-
sions were made about how to handle it?
Decision control during the experience
How much influence did you have over the decisions made by the [police/judge]?
Neutrality during the experience
Did the methods used by the [police/judge] favor one person over another
or
were
Were the [police/courts] honest in what they said to you?
Did the [police/judge] do anything that you thought was dishonest
or
improper?
Did they get the information needed to make good decisions about how to handle the
Did they try to bring the issues into the open
so
that they could be solved?
they equally fair to everyone involved?
issues involved?
178
TOM
R.
TYLER AND
E.
ALLAN LlND
Trust
How hard did your supervisor try to
be
fair to you?
Standing
How politely were you treated?
How much concern was shown for your rights?
Outcome consistent with others
When you compare the outcome of your experience to the outcome that people
generally receive in similar situations, did
you
receive about the same outcome as
others,
or
did
you
receive a better
or
worse outcome than others generally receive?
Outcome consistent with expectations
Was the outcome of your experience what you thought it would be
or
was it better
or
worse than you expected?
Correctability
Do
you know of any agency
or
organization that you could have complained to if you
had felt that the [police/courts] were unfair?
Evaluation
of
authority
How good a job are the [police/courts] doing?
How satisfied are you with how well the [police/courts] solve problems and help
How satisfied are
you
with the fairness of the outcomes that people receive when they
How satisfied are you with the fairness of the way the [police/courts] treat people and
those who come to them?
deal with the [police/courts]?
handle problems?
Compliance with laws
Have you often, sometimes, seldom,
or
never done each of the following things
during the past year:
Made enough noise to disturb your neighbors?
Littered in violation of the law?
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
179
Driven
an
automobile while intoxicated?
Driven over
55
miles per hour on the highway?
Taken inexpensive items from stores without paying for them?
Parked your car in violation of the law?
TYLER AND CAINE, 1981
Outcome favorability: students
[Class grade]
Outcome favorability: Political authorities
How much influence do you feel that you have over the decisions of the national
To
what extent do you think that the current policies of the national government
government?
benefit you?
Distributive justice: students
Did the student receive the grade they deserved?
Distributive justice: political authorities
Do you receive the outcomes you deserve?
Procedural justice: students
How fair were the grading procedures used in the class?
Procedural justice: political authorities
How fair are the procedures by which government decisions are made?
How fair are the procedures by which government benefits are distributed?
TYLER, CASPER, AND FISHER, 1989
Outcome favorability
Severity of sentence (no incarceration; some time in a jail; some time in a prison)
Months sentenced to serve
180
TOM
R. TYLER AND
E.
ALLAN LIND
Distributive justice
How does your sentence compare to that received by others who have committed the
same crime?
Procedural justice
Did your lawyer: believe your story; fight hard fm you; tell you the truth; listen to
Did the judge: tell the truth; follow the rules; try
to
determine if you were guilty;
Did the prosecutor: pay attention to your case; listen to all sides; want justice; and the
you; give
good
advice; and want justice?
listen to
all
sides; act in an unbiased way; and want justice?
tell the truth?
Attitudes toward authorities
Own lawyer
Fought hard
for
client
Wants client to plead guilty
Tells truth
to
client
Listens to client
Does not want client convicted
Wants light sentence for client
Wants justice for client
Not primarily concerned about making money
Does
not want client punished
Is
on
client’s side
Tried to establish guilt
or
innocence
Listened to all sides of the case
Did not want defendants punished
Wanted justice
Did not simply want convictions
Honest
Not out to get defendant
Unbiased
Not out to get defendant
Followed legal rules
Listened to all sides
Honest
Did not want all defendants punished
Wanted justice
Prosecutor
Judge
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
181
Plea bargaining
A
good way to settle case?
Benefits defendants?
Lightens sentences
Hurts the innocent
Interpersonal treatment
Treatment by the police during arrest.
Qpe
of lawyer [public defendantlprivate].
Time the lawyer spent with defendant.
Mode of deposition [plea bargainingltrial].
Potential sentence
Prior record.
Crime charged.
Days in detention prior to trial.
TYLER, RASINSKI, AND McGRAW, 1985
[Preamble] The government provides citizens with many types of services and bene-
fits, such as social security, Medicare and Medicaid, housing mortgage subsidies,
veterans benefits, student loans, and unemployment and workman’s compensa-
tion.
Outcome favorability
Do
you receive a great many, some, a few,
or
no
benefits from the government?
Distributive justice
Do
you feel that you receive a fair number
of
benefits
or
that you receive more or
fewer benefits than you deserve?
Procedural justice
How fair are the procedures by which the government decides who will receive
government benefits?
[Preamble] Consider the policies of the Reagan administration. First, let me ask you
about the economic policies of the Reagan administration, that is, the way it has
182
TOM
R.
TYLER
AND
E.
ALLAN LIND
handled the problems of inflation, unemployment, and the role
of
government in
the economy.
Outcome favorability
In general, how much
do
you
agree with the economic policies of the Reagan
administration?
How have those policies influenced your own economic situation? Would
you
say
that they have helped you, hurt you,
or
that they haven't had much effect on you?
Distributive justice
than is fair?
Do
you feel that these policies are fair to you
or
that they benefit you more
or
less
Procedural justice
In deciding what national policies to implement, do
you
think that President Rea-
gan
. . .
Considers the views
of
all
sides?
Takes enough time to consider policy decisions carefully?
Has enough information to make good policy decisions?
Is
unbiased and impartial?
Trust in national government
The government in Washington can usually
be
trusted to do what
is
right.
Most federal government agencies do a good job.
I
respect the political institutions of the American government.
My friends and
I
are well-represented in
our
political system.
TYLER
AND
SCHULLER,
1990
Outcome favorability
How favorable was the outcome
[of
the experience] to you?
How favorable was the outcome relative to what you expected prior to the experi-
ence?
Procedural justice
How fair were the procedures used
to
handle the problem?
How fairly were you treated by your supervisor?
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
183
Distributive justice
How fair was the outcome you received?
Process control during the experience
How much opportunity were you given to describe your problem before any deci-
sions were made about how to handle it?
Decision control during the experience
How much influence did you have over the decisions made by your supervisor?
Neutrality during the experience
Did the methods used by your supervisor favor one person over another or were they
Was your supervisor honest in what he said to you?
Did your supervisor do anything that you thought was dishonest
or
improper?
Did your supervisor get the information needed
to
make good decisions about how to
Did your supervisor try to bring the issues into the open
so
that they could
be
solved?
equally fair to everyone involved?
handle the issues involved?
Trusc
How much consideration did your supervisor give to your views when decisions were
How hard did your supervisor try to be fair to you?
How hard did your supervisor try to take account of your needs in the situation?
made about how to handle the problem?
Standing
How politely were you treated?
How much concern was shown by your supervisor for your rights?
Competence
How hard did the authority try to
.
Solve problem?
Find satisfactory solution?
Prevent future problems?
Reduce anger?
TOM
R.
TYLER
AND
E.
ALLAN LIND
Ethicalily
How hard did the authority
try
to
.
.
Consider your views
Explain decision?
Be fair to you?
Take account of your needs?
Outcome consistent with others
When you compare your outcome to the outcome people generally receive when they
go
to your supervisor with similar problems, did you receive about the same
outcome as others, or did you receive a better
or
worse outcome than others
usually receive?
Correctability
Could
you
have complained to higher authorities in your organization?
If you had complained, how likely is it that the complaint would have been
effective?
Could you have complained to your union?
If
you had complained, how likely is it that the complaint would have been
effective?
Could you have gone to court or complained to some government agency?
If you had complained, how likely is it that the complaint would have been
effective?
Legitimacy
(see
Organizational commitment)
Accept decision
How willing are you to accept the decision?
Follow rules
I
follow work mles and instructions with extreme care.
I
sometimes miss deadlines set by the organization.
I
follow the policies established by my supervisor.
Intention
to
quit
I
often think about quitting my job.
I
will probably look for a job outside my current organization in the next year.
AUTHORITY
IN
GROUPS
185
I
sometimes do things at work that
I
don’t agree with because
I
can’t afford to lose
my job.
Intention to sue organization
How much did you think about whether
or
not to complain to a government agency
or
go to court? Did you complain?
Supervisor competence
He/she tries very hard to solve the problems he/she deals with.
Helshe gets the information needed to make
good
decisions.
Supervisor trust
He/she tries very hard to be fair.
Helshe shows a real interest in trying
to
be fair to me.
Helshe considers people’s views when making decisions.
Management evaluation
Management can be trusted to make decisions that are also good for me.
I
trust management to treat me fairly.
Organizational commitment
I
am willing to put in a great deal
of
effort beyond that normally expected in order to
I
talk up the organization
I
work for
to
my friends as a great place to work.
I
would accept almost any type
of
job assignment to keep working where
I
work now.
I
find that my values and the values
of
the organization
I
work for
are
very similar.
1
am proud to tell others that
I
am part
of
the organization
I
work for.
The organization
I
work for really inspires me to do the very best job
I
can.
I
would recommend to close friends that they join the organization
I
work for.
help the organization
I
work
for
be successful.
Relative procedural desirability
Was your problem handled in the manner you expected,
or
was it handled in a better
or worse way than you expected?
Procedural desirability
How satisfied were you with the procedures that your supervisor used to handle
your
problems?
186
TOM R. TYLER AND E. ALLAN LlND
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