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Justice rules are standards that serve as criteria for formulating fairness judgments. Though justice rules play a role in the organizational justice literature, they have seldom been the subject of analysis in their own right. To address this limitation, we first consider three meta-theoretical dualities that are highlighted by justice rules – the distinction between justice versus fairness, indirect versus direct measurement, and normative versus descriptive paradigms. Second, we review existing justice rules and organize them into four types of justice: distributive (e.g., equity, equality), procedural (e.g., voice, consistent treatment), interpersonal (e.g., politeness, respectfulness), and informational (e.g., candor, timeliness). We also emphasize emergent rules that have not received sufficient research attention. Third, we consider various computation models purporting to explain how justice rules are assessed and aggregated to form fairness judgments. Fourth and last, we conclude by reviewing research that enriches our understanding of justice rules by showing how they are cognitively processed. We observe that there are a number of influences on fairness judgments, and situations exist in which individuals do not systematically consider justice rules.

Using data collected from professionals in a large U.S. national public accounting firm, we explored gender differences in perceived levels of role stress and job outcomes as well as the effects of a healthy lifestyle as a coping mechanism for role stress, burnout, and related job outcomes. Our large sample size (1,681) and equal participation by women (49.7 percent) and men (50.3 percent) allowed us to analyze the causal relationships of these variables using a previously tested multi-disciplinary research model (Jones, Norman, & Wier, 2010). We found that women and men perceive similar levels of role stress as defined by role ambiguity and role overload, and that women perceive less role conflict. Men and women perceive similar levels of job satisfaction and job performance. Contrary to earlier studies, women do not report higher levels of turnover intentions. Results show that efforts of the public accounting firms over the past decade may be somewhat successful in reducing the levels of role stress and turnover intentions among women. Another plausible explanation could be that an expansionist theory of gender, work, and family (Barnett & Hyde, 2001) may now be responsible for improved well-being of females to the point where the genders have converged in their experience of role stress and job outcomes in public accounting.

This study, based on our analysis of survey data from 1,242 partners and employees of a U.S. national public accounting firm, examines the impact on psychological well-being from the moderating effects of flexibility and role clarity on work-home conflict experienced by public accountants. Most prior research in public accounting deals with the antecedents and consequences of role stress and primarily focuses on job outcomes of turnover intentions and job satisfaction as dependent variables. Public accounting firms have responded to stressors with worker-friendly policies, largely by introducing flexibility and clarity in their organizational culture. Using a multi-disciplinary research model, we analyze the causal relationships of flexibility and clarity as moderators of the bi-directional nature of work-home conflict (work interference with home and home interference with work) on psychological well-being. Our study finds that perceptions of flexibility and role clarity drawn from a career position in public accounting can mitigate role conflict between work and home environments and contribute to enhanced psychological well-being. We also find that certain relationships described in the model are moderated by family status and age, but not by gender. Results of our study have implications to both individual public accountants and to their firms.

We investigate auditor objectivity as it relates to engagement quality reviews by examining whether engagement quality reviewers (EQRs) exhibit lower levels of objectivity when they have administrative, economic, or social ties with the audit engagement partner. Motivated reasoning theory suggests that EQRs with ties to the engagement partner will reach less conservative conclusions and be more willing to accept an engagement partner's decision relative to reviewers who have no connections with the engagement partner. We conduct an experiment where EQRs must review a decision by an engagement partner related to a contingent liability.

Results suggest that engagement quality reviews are an effective mechanism for reducing the effects of engagement partner biases to accept client-favored accounting choices. Participants with ties to the engagement partner (i.e., from the same office) and without ties (i.e., from the national office) both challenged the decision of the engagement partner and recommended disclosure of a contingent liability, which client management opposed. We also find an interaction of ties with the engagement partner and the probability of the contingent liability. National office EQRs were less likely to decide that disclosure was necessary than were local office partners when the probability of the contingent liability was low. With regard to the need to recognize a liability, EQRs with and without ties to the engagement partner concurred with the decision of the engagement partner.