Justice Change Matters: Approach and Avoidance Mechanisms Underlying the Regulation of Justice Over Time

The experience of justice is a dynamic phenomenon that changes over time, yet few studies have directly examined justice change. In this article, we integrate theories of self-regulation and group engagement to derive predictions about the consequences of justice change. We posit that justice change...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of applied psychology 2022-07, Vol.107 (7), p.1070-1093
Main Authors: Xu, Xiao-min, Du, Danyang, Johnson, Russell E., Lu, Chang-qin
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Approach Avoidance
Avoidance
Avoidance behavior
Behavior change
Behavior modification
Employees
Employment
Employment Status
Fatigue
Female
Group dynamics
Human
Humans
Justice
Male
Multisource
Occupational status
Organizational Justice
Perceptions
Prediction
Regulation
Regulation theory
Self control
Self regulation
Social Justice
Test Construction
Theories
Work Engagement
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Summary:The experience of justice is a dynamic phenomenon that changes over time, yet few studies have directly examined justice change. In this article, we integrate theories of self-regulation and group engagement to derive predictions about the consequences of justice change. We posit that justice change is an important factor because, as suggested by self-regulation theory, people are particularly sensitive to change. Also consistent with self-regulation, we posit that experiencing justice change will influence behavior via separate approach and avoidance systems. Across three multiwave and multisource field studies, we found that justice change predicts employees' engagement in work via perceived insider status along an approach path, whereas it predicts employees' withdrawal from work via exhaustion along an avoidance path, after controlling for the effects of static justice level. Moreover, these approach and avoidance effects are bounded by employees' perception of their employment situation, consistent with a regulatory fit pattern. As expected, employees' perceptions of employment opportunity, which correspond to gains, strengthen the effects along the approach path. Meanwhile, their perceptions of threat of job continuity, which correspond to losses, strengthen the effects along the avoidance path. Importantly, our set of studies highlight the unique influence of justice change incremental to static justice level.
ISSN:0021-9010
1939-1854
1939-1854
DOI:10.1037/apl0000973