Inequity aversion under procedural justice in deaf college students: an ERP study

The inconsistent change of inequity aversion under procedural justice may result from the individual difference of cognitive processing ability for information. Deaf college students' social cognition is challenged by systemic barriers that limit inclusive communication and social interaction. However, it is still unknown how inequity aversion manifests among deaf college students in the context of procedural justice. In this study, we recruited 28 deaf and 31 hearing college students by using a modified dictator game combined with Event-related potentials (ERPs). Behavioral results showed that all participants were more satisfied with equitable offer, extremely advantageous inequitable and moderately advantageous inequitable offers, followed by moderately disadvantageous inequitable offers, and lowest for extremely disadvantageous inequitable offers. Interestingly, we found only in deaf college students that the extremely, moderately advantageous inequitable and moderately disadvantageous inequitable offers all induced more negative feedback-related negativity (FRN) than equitable offer. Furthermore, the equitable offer induced more positive P300 than any of the inequitable offers. The results indicated that even under procedural justice, deaf college students still exhibit pronounced inequity aversion, highlighting their preference to fairness norms. These findings empirically characterize inequity aversion in special populations and provide theoretical support for enhancing educational integration in colleges and universities.