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Substantive justice: how the substantive law shapes perceived fairness

Description
Psychology of justice research has demonstrated that individuals are concerned with both the process and the outcomes of a decision-making event. While the literature has demonstrated the importance of formal and informal aspects of procedural justice and the relevancy of moral values, the present study focuses on introducing a new…

Psychology of justice research has demonstrated that individuals are concerned with both the process and the outcomes of a decision-making event. While the literature has demonstrated the importance of formal and informal aspects of procedural justice and the relevancy of moral values, the present study focuses on introducing a new form of justice: Substantive justice. Substantive justice focuses on how the legal system uses laws to constrain and direct human behavior, specifically focusing on the function and the structure of a law. The psychology of justice literature is missing the vital distinction between laws whose function is to create social opportunities versus threats and between laws structured concretely versus abstractly. In the present experiment, we found that participant evaluations of the fairness of the law, the outcome, and the decision-maker all varied depending on the function and structure of the law used as well as the outcome produced. Specifically, when considering adverse outcomes, individuals perceived laws whose function is to create liability (threats) as being fairer when structured as standards (abstract guidelines) rather than rules (concrete guidelines); however, the opposite is true when considering laws whose function is to create eligibility (opportunities). In juxtaposition, when receiving a favorable outcome, individuals perceived laws whose function is to create liability (threats) as being fairer when defined as rules (concrete guidelines) rather than standards (abstract guidelines).
ContributorsLovis-McMahon, David (Author) / Schweitzer, Nicholas J. (Thesis advisor) / Saks, Michael (Thesis advisor) / Kwan, Sau (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2011
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You Understand, So I Understand: How A "Community of Knowledge" Shapes Trust in Expert Evidence

Description
This experiment uses the Community of Knowledge framework to better understand how jurors interpret new information (Sloman & Rabb, 2016). Participants learned of an ostensibly new scientific finding that was claimed to either be well-understood or not understood by experts. Despite including no additional information, expert understanding led participants to…

This experiment uses the Community of Knowledge framework to better understand how jurors interpret new information (Sloman & Rabb, 2016). Participants learned of an ostensibly new scientific finding that was claimed to either be well-understood or not understood by experts. Despite including no additional information, expert understanding led participants to believe that they personally understood the phenomenon, with expert understanding acting as a cue for trustworthiness and believability. This effect was particularly pronounced with low-quality sources. These results are discussed in the context of how information is used by jurors in court, and the implications of the “Community of Knowledge” effect being used by expert witnesses.
ContributorsJones, Ashley C. T. (Author) / Schweitzer, Nicholas J. (Thesis advisor) / Neal, Tess M.S. (Committee member) / Salerno, Jessica M. (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2018
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The reading of rotated text, an embodied account

Description
Individuals engaged in perceptual tasks often use their bodies to lighten the cognitive load, that is, they replace internal (mental) processing with external (body-based) processing. The present investigation explores how the body is used in the task of reading rotated text. The experimental design allowed the participants to exhibit spontaneous…

Individuals engaged in perceptual tasks often use their bodies to lighten the cognitive load, that is, they replace internal (mental) processing with external (body-based) processing. The present investigation explores how the body is used in the task of reading rotated text. The experimental design allowed the participants to exhibit spontaneous behavior and choose what strategies to use in order to efficiently complete the task. The results demonstrate that the use of external strategies can benefit performance by offloading internal processing.
ContributorsMedimorec, Srdan (Author) / Schweitzer, Nicholas J. (Thesis advisor) / Risko, Evan F. (Committee member) / Newman, Matt L. (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013