Abstract
There is a paucity of empirical research on the social psychology of justice in educational settings. A few previous studies have predominantly focused on distributive and procedural justice concerns, and knowledge about the role of what have been called informational and interpersonal justice for school outcomes is very scarce. In the present study, data from 227 eighth- and ninth-grade students who participated in a survey study were analyzed to examine the interplay between relational justice concerns (decomposed into procedural, interpersonal, and informational justice), motivation to study, and school achievement. A comprehensive theoretically grounded multi-item measure of informational justice was developed and validated. The results showed that informational justice significantly predicts school grades, and that motivation to study fully mediates this effect. Neither procedural nor interpersonal justice was associated with school grades. The implications of these results for research and practice are discussed in detail.
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Notes
In order to test the moderating effect of gender, two interaction terms were built and entered to the regression models, i.e., informational justice by gender and motivation by gender. Prior to building the interaction terms, informational justice and motivation to study were centered on their means, and gender was dummy coded (male students were coded as 1 and female students as 0). The analyses revealed no significant interaction effects on grades.
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Thanks are due to Clara Sabbagh, Nura Resh, and Kjell Törnblom for valuable comments on earlier drafts of this article.
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Kazemi, A. Examining the Interplay of Justice Perceptions, Motivation, and School Achievement among Secondary School Students. Soc Just Res 29, 103–118 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11211-016-0261-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11211-016-0261-2