Do Just Trainer Behaviors Matter? An Investigation of Felt Obligation, Affect, and Endorsement of the Just World Hypothesis

We explore whether justice-related trainer behaviors can contribute to positive training outcomes, with just behaviors defined according to the organizational justice literature. We also explore possible psychological mechanisms that may explain why just trainer behaviors matter, focusing on positive affect and felt obligation. The importance of just world beliefs is also investigated. In 100 individual training sessions, we manipulated trainer behaviors, just or unjust, and primed trainees with a message regarding whether the world is just. Just trainer behaviors related directly to increased trainee transfer motivation and indirectly to both transfer self-efficacy (via positive affect) and training performance (via general justice perceptions). Belief in a just world played no significant role.