Distributional justice—measured by the proportionality between effort exerted and rewards obtained—and guilt aversion—triggered by not fulfilling others’ expectations—are widely acknowledged fundamental sources of pro-social behavior. We design three experiments to study the relevance of these sources of behavior when considered in interaction. In particular, we investigate whether subjects fulfill others’ expectations also when this could produce inequitable allocations that conflict with distributional justice considerations. Our results confirm that both justice considerations and guilt aversion are important drivers of pro-social behavior, with the former having an overall stronger impact than the latter. Expectations of others are less relevant in environments more likely to nurture equitable outcomes.

分配正义——通过付出的努力和获得的回报之间的比例来衡量——以及因不满足他人的期望而引发的内疚厌恶——被广泛认为是亲社会行为的基本来源。我们设计了三个实验来研究这些行为来源在互动中的相关性。特别是，我们调查受试者是否满足其他人的期望，当这可能产生与分配公平考虑相冲突的不公平分配时。我们的结果证实，正义考虑和内疚厌恶都是亲社会行为的重要驱动因素，前者比后者具有更大的整体影响。在更有可能培养公平结果的环境中，其他人的期望不太相关。