Organizational justice involves an employee’s perceptions of the fairness of
treatment received from the employer (Colquitt, 2001). There are at least three types of
organizational justice. The first type, distributive justice, pertains to employee
perceptions regarding the fairness of organizational outcomes such as pay raises,
promotions, or layoffs. The second type, procedural justice, refers to perceptions of the
fairness of procedures used to make organizational decisions (e.g. the consistency in
appraising employee performance). Finally, interpersonal justice involves employee
perceptions of fairness concerning the treatment received from organizational
decision-makers (e.g. the boss’ level of respectfulness when interacting with
employees). Here, we focus on interpersonal justice because it is more general than
the other two types and does not involve a particular referent (i.e. a specific
organizational decision).