Reminders of behavioral disinhibition increase public conformity in the Asch paradigm and behavioral affiliation with ingroup members.

This paper argues that being in the Asch situation, where there is a felt need to conform to others' faulty behaviors, poses a social threat to people. Furthermore, participating in a psychology experiment in which you will have to interact with other participants might trigger sense-making processes. The paper proposes that these assumed threats or sense-making processes are likely to activate the behavioral inhibition system, making people respond in more inhibited ways than they normally would be inclined to do. As a result, people's tendency to affiliate behaviorally with persons who are similar to them can be inhibited. The implication is that lowering behavioral inhibition (by experimentally reminding people about having acted without behavioral inhibitions) should lead to more public conformity in the Asch situation and stronger behavioral affiliation with ingroup members than not being reminded about behavioral disinhibition. Findings of four experiments support this line of reasoning. These findings are discussed in terms of behavioral inhibition and behavioral affiliation. Alternative accounts of the data that focus on social belongingness threats and optimal distinctiveness are also considered.

How do I judge my outcome when I do not know the outcome of others? The psychology of the fair process effect.

On the basis of fairness heuristic theory, the authors provide an explanation of the frequently replicated fair process effect (the finding that perceived procedural fairness positively affects how people react to outcomes). The authors argue that, in many situations, people may find it difficult to assess whether their outcome is fair or unfair and satisfying or unsatisfying because they only have information about their own outcome and they do not know the outcomes of others and that, in these situations, people use the fairness of the procedure as a heuristic substitute to assess how to judge their outcome. The results of 2 experiments corroborate the authors' line of reasoning. Findings are discussed in terms of recent developments toward an integration of the procedural and distributive justice domains.