Procedural and distributive justice effects moderated by organizational identification

Purpose – The purpose of the research was to test whether the widely known interaction between procedural and distributive justice influences cooperation, but only when employees’ identification with the organization is strong. Design/methodology/approach – A survey study was conducted in a company, including scales assessing distributive justice, procedural justice, employees’ sense of organizational identification and willingness to cooperate. Findings – The results showed that this interaction effect was only found among those with a strong sense of organizational identification. However, the pattern of this interaction was different from the pattern found in previous studies, that is, both high procedural and distributive justice was required to best predict cooperation. Originality/value – These findings identify yet another important moderator of the interaction between distributive justice and procedural justice, but also show that because of the cognitive content of the measure of organizational identification, the shape of the interaction is different than the one predicted by prior research.

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