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We systematically analyze the role of social comparison processes in organizations. Specifically, we describe how social comparison processes have been used to explain six key areas of organizational inquiry: (1) organizational justice, (2) performance appraisal, (3) virtual work environments, (4) affective behavior in the workplace, (5) stress, and (6) leadership. Additionally, we describe how unique contextual factors in organizations offer new insight into two widely studied sub-processes of social comparison, acquiring social information and thinking about that information. Our analyses underscore the merit of integrating organizational phenomena and social comparison processes in future research and theory.

Fairness perceptions and sales performance measures were collected from salespersons working originally under a salary-only pay system and subsequently under a salary-plus-commission pay system (i.e., a pay-for-performance plan). Perceptions of organizational fairness were enhanced by the use of a formal pay-for-performance system, although perceptions of individual managers' fairness were reduced by such a plan. Consistent with correspondent inference theory, the formal pay-for-performance pay plan discouraged respondents from crediting their supervisors with the fairness of their actions. The plan also brought significant performance decrements among those who believed they were not being paid for their performance (despite the fact that they were supposed to be). The limitations of mandated fair organizational practices are discussed.

Customer service representatives ( N =270) were underpaid for completing an hour-long questionnaire after working hours. They were told that the payment came either from the company itself or from a group of individual managers. Participants were given an opportunity to steal by being allowed to take their payment from a bowl of pennies under conditions in which they believed that the actual amount they took could not be detected. Employees who had attained Kohlberg's conventional level of moral development refrained from stealing money when they worked in an office that had an ethics program in place. However, those at the preconventional level of development and who worked at an office without an ethics program stole from their employers. By contrast, participants who believed that the money came from individual managers refrained from stealing under any conditions. These results are explained in terms of the person-by-situation interactionist approach to ethical behavior. Their practical implications are discussed as well.

A central premise of the procedural justice literature—based on studies conducted mainly in the United States—is that people react unfavorably when they have little voice in a decision-making process. The studies reported here evaluated whether the magnitude of voice effects varies across cultures. As predicted, Studies 1–3 showed that the tendency for people to respond less favorably (i.e., with lower organizational commitment) to lower levels of voice was greater in low power distance cultures (United States and Germany) than in high power distance cultures (People's Republic of China, Mexico, and Hong Kong). And in a single cultural setting, Study 4 found a similar interactive effect of voice and people's power distance beliefs on employees' work attitudes and job performance. Theoretical implications for the justice and cross-cultural literatures are discussed, as are practical implications and suggestions for future research.

I argue that organizational researchers and theorists should address seven important issues inspired by Cropanzano et al.'s (2001) “what, why, and how” questions about organizational justice. Specifically, our collective justice agenda should examine the following questions: (1) What is the conceptual status of interactional justice? (2) How are reactions to injustice related to the source of injustice? (3) Are the motives underlying justice behavior really distinct? (4) What is the role of control in creating justice? (5) How are referent others selected? (6) How are “would, could, and should” judgments interrelated? and (7) Is justice a cause or consequence of social motives?

Three experiments were conducted to examine subjects’ impressions of the performance of employees believed to be new to their jobs. Experiment 1 was a laboratory experiment in which 88 undergraduate students evaluated the performance of an instructor giving a lecture. Experiment 2 was a naturalistic field experiment in which 118 shoppers at a discount store evaluated the performance of the employees who bagged their orders. Finally, Experiment 3 was a field experiment in which 69 people responding to a telephone survey evaluated the performance of the interviewer. In all three experiments, participants who were not adversely affected by the workers’ job performance evaluated the workers more highly when they were believed to be new than when they had no knowledge of workers’ experience. In this case, the positive impressions sought by identifying one's newness were observed. These effects were also found among subjects rating workers who performed their jobs well despite their new status, providing evidence of an augmentation effect. However, subjects who were adversely affected by the workers’ actions evaluated workers lower when they were believed to be new than when they had no knowledge of workers’ experience. As such, the desired impression management effects backfired. The practical implications of these findings are discussed.

Members of high-school swim teams (n = 120) swam a 100-yard freestyle either as members of a four-person relay team or as individuals swimming alone. In all cases, a performance time goal established in pretesting to be perceived as difficult, but acceptable, was announced by the coaches (i.e., the desired time to swim the required distance by either an individual or by the relay team as a whole). Further announced was a punishment threat for failing to meet this standard—a number of penalty laps established in pretesting to be perceived as either a severe threat, a moderate threat, or no threat. Consistent with previous research on the social loafing effect, it was found that individuals in groups performed worse (i.e., swam slower) than individuals performing alone under conditions in which punishment threats were not issued. In contrast, when substandard performance was threatened with punishment, group performance improved, and the social loafing effect was attenuated. The implications and limitations of these findings for maximizing task performance are discussed.

Female undergraduates scoring high and low on the Mirels-Garrett Protestant Ethic (PE) Scale divided a fixed reward between themselves and a co-worker following competition on a clerical task. Half the subjects were told that they had either won or lost in fair competition. The remaining subjects were told they had either won or lost because of an error that gave a favorable advantage to one of the performers. When the competition was fair, high PEs distributed the rewards available according to an equity norm, keeping more than half when they won and less than half when they lost. When the competition was unfair, high PEs attempted to reestablish fairness by compensating the performer with the unfair disadvantage. However, low PEs kept approximately half the reward regardless of fairness and regardless of whether they won or lost.

Two studies are reported which show how endorsement of the Protestant ethic is related to the perceived fairness of using various equity inputs. In Experiment 1, male undergraduates scoring high and low on the Protestant Ethic (PE) Scale made salary decisions for hypothetical workers who differed with respect to their performance quantity and duration. High PEs paid workers in proportion to their total productivity by taking into account both quantity and duration. However, low PEs ignored differences in quantity by paying workers the same amount, but did pay in proportion to duration. In the follow-up study, high PEs reported that it is fairer to base reward on performance when differences are attributable to internal causes than external causes, while the reverse was found for low PEs.

Two-hundred male undergraduates, individually and in groups of five, divided a fixed reward between two performers with unequal inputs under conditions in which they either expected or did not expect future interaction with recipients. Individuals who anticipated future interaction with recipients divided the reward equally, while groups divided the reward equitably. When interaction was not expected, individuals divided the reward equitably by discriminating between recipients, while groups made more extreme discriminations (the group polarization effect). Experiencing group discussions made individuals more confident in the fairness of their subsequent allocations. The results are discussed in terms of the social and informational influences of groups on allocation decisions.

It was proposed that harmdoers who psychologically suffer (e.g., experience remorse, guilt) through victimizing another will be viewed as having already taken a step toward righting the injustice caused the victim. Consequently, they should be asked to make fewer reparations and assigned a lesser fine than those harmdoers who do not express guilt or remorse. Male and female subjects read scenarios depicting an accident in which the harmdoer either admitted or did not admit responsibility (Experiment 1) or expressed various degrees of remorsefulness (Experiment 3). Both investigations indicated that a show of remorse or of a remorseful gesture (i.e., assuming responsibility) can partially vindicate harmdoers by requiring them to make fewer reparations to a victim (Experiment 1) or pay less of a fine (Experiment 3) among females only. Thus psychological damages incurred in a wrongful act can serve as a “down payment” toward restoring justice. In corroboration with these findings of sex differences, Experiment 2 revealed that females consider to a greater extent than males reasons such as a harmdoer's feelings when assigning a fine.

Male and female undergraduates read aloud statements about women which were either attitudinally consistent, discrepant, or neutral relative to their attitudes toward women. Following this, they were given the opportunity to choose to wait in front of a mirror or a nonreflecting wall. Subjects engaging in attitudinally discrepant behavior avoided self-focusing stimuli; those engaging in attitudinally consistent behavior sought contact with self-focusing stimuli. Intermediate tendencies to seek or avoid self-focused stimuli were demonstrated by subjects reading attitudinally neutral material. The theory of objective self-awareness was extended by demonstrating that self-focusing stimuli are not just avoided in response to negative discrepancies, but are sought out in response to attitude-behavior consistencies.