The Merits of Unconscious Processing of Directly and Indirectly Obtained Information About Social Justice

Abstract

This paper focuses on how people process information obtained directly (through own observation) or indirectly (through communication). In two experiments, participants read about a complex legal case partly consisting of directly or indirectly obtained information. Next, participants made judgments about who was guilty in the case. Participants made their judgments immediately (immediate decision condition), could consciously think about their judgments for a couple of minutes (conscious thought condition), or were distracted for a couple of minutes and then made their judgments (unconscious thought condition). Results indicated that judgments about who was guilty in the conscious thought condition suffered from directly obtained information but not from indirectly obtained information, whereas the reverse was found in the immediate judgment condition. Judgments made through unconscious thinking were not influenced by the distinction between directly and indirectly obtained information, and were always better than judgments derived from immediate decisions or conscious thought.

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