The effect of perception of justice on social identity: The mediating role of emotions

This study investigates the effect of perceived justice on social identity within the framework of social ıdentity theory, and examines whether emotions play a mediating role in this interaction. The research comprises three separate experimental studies, in which participants were randomly assigned to fair, unfair, or control conditions. In each condition, participants were exposed to scenarios with varying justice content as a form of manipulation. Subsequently, their perceptions of justice, emotional responses, reward distribution preferences, and levels of social identity were measured. To test the research hypotheses, ANOVA, regression, and mediation analyses were conducted. In the first study (n = 149), the results revealed that the justice manipulation significantly affected both justice perceptions and emotional responses. In particular, participants exposed to the unfair condition reported a significant decrease in perceived justice and an increase in negative emotions (e.g., anger, sadness). However, no significant effect was found regarding the impact of justice perception on social identity. Based on this finding, a second study was conducted (n = 56). In this study, participants in the unfair condition were more likely to choose the option "I will take the entire reward for myself"; however, the difference between conditions was not statistically significant. Again, no significant effect was observed on social identity. Finally, in the third study (n = 93), reward distribution preferences significantly differed across justice conditions, indicating that the manipulations of justice did, in fact, influence social identity. Additionally, justice perception scores were found to be positively associated with feelings of belonging and the importance placed on the group. Furthermore, the analysis showed that anger partially mediated the effect of justice perception on ingroup-related reward allocation. The findings are discussed in light of the existing literature, the limitations of the study are addressed, and recommendations for future research are presented.