Relational Concerns in Fairness Judgements

When people make judgments about the fairness of distributions, they do so not just as calculators of costs and benefits, but as socially situated beings who are sensitive to relevant social relationships. They understand that people play particular roles within a larger social fabric that shapes their identities and expectations, and that their self image is affected by appraisals of how well (or not) they perform these roles. We designate here as relational concerns the considerations that arise from these roles and relationships, and study how they affect judgments of fairness. A series of vignette studies is used to explore how relational concerns compare with the impartial principles of equity and equality that fairness is commonly held to entail. We provide evidence that for participants based in the UK and in India, relational concerns are important for judging the fairness of distributions where people coordinate around shared goals. We also show that relational concerns may vary across cultural communities.