Using two randomized controlled courtroom experiments on actual litigants at court hearings, we examine a thus far unexplored reason why perceived procedural justice can be strongly associated with litigants' trust in judges and legitimate power assigned to judges. We argue that because litigants try to make sense of what is happening at their hearings, they will tend to inhibit ongoing action in order to pause and check what is going on in the courtroom. During this state of behavioral inhibition, experiences of how fairly judges are treating them will have a sturdy impact on litigants’ reactions. This explanation implies that an experimental manipulation known to weaken behavioral inhibition should attenuate the positive association between perceived procedural justice and trust and legitimacy ratings. The results of both experiments support this line of reasoning. We discuss the implications for the understanding of the psychology of procedural justice and the robustness of priming effects in experimental social psychology.

中文翻译：

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关于为何程序正义在法庭听证会上很重要：行为抑制抑制削弱了程序正义与法官评估之间联系的实验证据

我们使用两个在法庭听证会上对实际诉讼人进行的随机控制的法庭实验，研究了迄今为止尚待探索的原因，为什么程序正义可以与诉讼人对法官的信任和分配给法官的合法权力密切相关。我们认为，由于诉讼人试图弄清听证会上发生的事情，因此他们倾向于抑制正在进行的行动，以便暂停并检查法庭上正在发生的事情。在这种行为抑制状态下，法官如何公平对待他们的经验将对诉讼人的反应产生坚固的影响。这种解释意味着，已知的一种削弱行为抑制的实验性操作应能减弱感知到的程序正义与信任和合法性等级之间的正相关。这两个实验的结果都支持这一思路。我们讨论了对程序正义心理学的理解以及实验社会心理学中激发作用的鲁棒性的含义。