Keeping Self-Interest Under Control:
Effects of Procedural Fairness and Project Success Rate
in A Cost Reduction Context
Ertambang Nahartyo
Universitas Gadjah Madaertambang@gmail.com

Intiyas Utami
Satya Wacana Christian University
intiyas@staff.uksw.edu

We thank Faculty of Economics and Business Universitas Gadjah Mada for funding this project.

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ABSTRACTIn this research, we experimentally investigate the effects of procedural fairness (fair andno fair) and success rate (low and high of a cost reduction project) on self-interest
behavior. We compare a fair procedure condition that provides detail information
regarding colleagues’ cost structure and their willingness to sacrifice with an unfair
condition without such information. We also assign participants into two conditions ofsuccess rate: low and high. Individuals who encounter a higher success rate condition are
expected to incline to self-interest choice. Ultimately, we hypothesize that procedural
fairness and success rate have an interaction effect on self-interest behavior.
We conduct a controlled laboratory experiment to investigate individual decision
process in a standard costing setting. The participants are 136 undergraduate businessstudents enrolled in management accounting class at three large private universities thatassume as the managers in a production department. They complete an experimental
task via computer.
The result of our experiment indicates a mitigating effect of procedural fairness on theindividuals’ self-interest behavior once the individuals realize the pressure of cost
reduction process. The findings allow the conclusion that both self-interest and social
preferences are guiding motivational factors of individual behavior. The findings indicatethat people are willing to pursue organizational goal on the expense of their personal
benefits. The result also shows the process of how to encourage employees to undertakeprojects that decrease their current benefit but potentially have future organizational
payoff. However, we do not find the interaction effect between procedural fairness andsuccess rate.
Keywords: Self-interest, procedural fairness, success rate

1. Introduction
Firms that deal with intense competition must become excellent in developing low-cost, highquality products that have value in the eyes of customers. Cost, quality, and value have beeneffective competitive weapons and managed throughout competing firms in the past three
decades. Accordingly, rapid progress in high technology and increasingly competitive
international markets have led to changes in management accounting practices in developed
countries such as USA and Japan (Atkinson et al. 2012; Monden and Monden 2007; Nishimura
2003).

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Unfortunately, the wave of change does not seem to positively affect Indonesia’scompetitiveness. In fact, higher product costs driven by domestic cost inflation, which includes
higher labor costs, have weakened Indonesia’s capability to compete internationally, let alone
globally. According to International Monetary Fund (IMF), Indonesia’s unit labor cost have beensteadily increasing and constantly eroding the Nation’s competitiveness (Thee 2006). Other
research reports that in recent years China, India, and Vietnam have emerged as strong
competitors to Indonesia, since the countries export the same low-skill, labor-intensive product(Waheeduzzaman 2011).
To gain the competitive advantage, firms in Indonesia must ceaselessly research and develop low
cost yet high quality products that meet the market’s expectation. Firms have to put importanceon how to reduce cost continuously. The yardstick of cost management should shift from how
to meet standard cost to continuous cost reduction.
Cost reduction or continuous improvement context has been a fruitful area in management
accounting research (e.g., Chenhall and Smith 2011; Lam 2011). Research has focused on
measurement and control of factory costs. Companies control costs in all value-adding stages,
including production phase (Endenich et al. 2011). Extant literature suggests that cost reduction
process require cooperation among workers and managers (Nishimura 2003). Research showsthat to ascertain continuous improvement in production phase, companies emphasize on theimportance of organizing work that stimulates all employees cooperation (Abrahamsson andGerdin 2006). The working task of production employees has been extended to active
engagement in reducing costs. Production employees should continually seek out and eliminate
sources of process imperfection (Wynder 2008).
Hence, the effectiveness of cost reduction process depends heavily on human factors. Wynder(2008) finds that efficient involvement of managers in cost-reduction efforts can be achieved by
employing activity-based costing information or by relying on manager’s intuitive understanding3

of production process. Research shows that transforming shopfloor workers’ responsibility fromvertical perspective to a more horizontally-oriented can enhance employee cooperation incontinuous improvement (Abrahamsson and Gerdin 2006). Lam (2011) finds that individuals are
more likely to be involved in continuous improvement process when they are evaluated over the
longer evaluation window.
Nevertheless, previous research has, at best, provided incomplete answers regarding how
individuals behave during the process of providing contribution within a production cost
reduction context. Specifically, extant studies in the context have been based on behavioral
assumptions that are subject to potential egocentric biases. Economic rationality is the main
realm of behavioral decision research (Bazerman and Tenbrunsel 1998). A common assumptionof classic economic models is that individuals would act opportunistically for private gain at theexpense of collective (Jensen and Meckling 1976). While this assumption is valid to explain
behavioral tendency of people in certain conditions, it may only partially represent the behavioralof people in various settings (Ghoshal 2005). The assumption has been undermined by actual
decisions of individuals which cannot be predicted by rational economic models. There is strong
empirical evidence that individuals are subject to boundedly rational behavior (Bigus 2012).
Individuals in fact make decisions that are inconsistent with economic rationality (e.g., Rankin etal. 2008; Booker et al. 2007).
This study differs from prior research because it focuses on individuals’ self interest mitigation ina production cost reduction setting. This psychological focus is aimed at addressing anunanswered question of previous studies: whether individuals participating in a collective effort
are able to control their self interest leanings when they are exposed to social and psychologicalpressures. Specifically, this experimental study proposes that individuals are faced with a conflictof interest when they see a possibility to realize personal gain from their participation in astandard cost setting process but their self interest runs against the interests of the organization4

as a whole. We expect that participation in the process of determining production standard costaffects the extent to which individuals perceive this conflict of interest to constitute an ethicaldilemma.
We address an important question related to a factor that can undermine individuals’ selfinterest: how perceived procedural fairness affects individuals’ decision? Previous studies findthat people involving in a participative decision making are concerned with how fair theprocedures are (e.g., Nahartyo 2013; Wan et al. 2012). Research indicates that managers often
have a stronger reaction toward the fairness of the procedures than that toward distributive
fairness (Luo 2007; Konovsky 2000). While studies reporting reactions to fair procedures has
demonstrated solid results, the literature has not yet provided conclusive evidence whether
procedural fairness affects individuals’ decisions in setting standard cost. Specifically, the study
examines the role of procedural fairness, particularly the "soft side" (i.e. group value) ofprocedural justice elements, in explaining how individuals take into account fairness conditions
in making standard cost decision.
The research also focuses on the effect of uncertainty or ambiguity on individuals’ resource
allocation decisions. Previous research shows that individuals’ perception of the risks involved(i.e. level of uncertainty and/or ambiguity) influence their choice of options. This perception
alters their self-interest behavior. We conjecture that the level of success rate is of importance indetermining standard cost decision. Psychology theory, particularly expectancy theory, suggeststhat people are willing to postpone short term benefit when there is an acceptable likelihood of
future payoff (e.g. Fudge and Schlacter 1999). Therefore, related to the first question above, we
address the literature gap using the second question: are the effects of procedural fairness
different depending on the success rate? Based on the theory, we expect that there is a negative
relation between success rate and individuals’ willingness to delay short-term gain.

5This study contributes to behavioral management accounting literature in two ways. First, it
considers the impact of social preferences as well as personal perception on resource allocation
decisions. The expected findings allow the conclusion that both self-interest and social
preferences are guiding motivational factors of individual behavior. Such explanation, foranswering why people must pursue organizational goal on the expense of their personal benefit,
are relevant to the broader topics of self-control and organizational commitment, and has
implications for settings such as workplace. Secondly, this research is expected to shed lights on
the process of how to encourage employees to undertake risky projects that decrease current
financial benefit but potentially have future organizational advantages.
We will test our hypotheses by conducting a laboratory experiment in which 136 undergraduate
business students each will act as a member of production department management. All subjects
are to make decisions regarding product standard cost. We posit that when subjects have theopportunity to participate in a standard costing process, they have incentives to alter the decision
to acquire a greater share of resources. We manipulate both procedural fairness and success rate
between subjects at two levels. In the fair condition, subjects receive information regarding thewillingness of their colleagues to reduce their share of resources (wages) and to disclose theircost structure, whereas in the no-fair condition subjects do not receive such information. In thelow(high) risk project condition, subjects are informed that the estimates success rate of the
project is 80 percent (between 20-40 percent).
2. Background and Hypotheses
Setting
Assume there is an individual who works in a production department. Her duty is to determine
the standard cost of a particular product. The standard cost consists of three elements: material,labor, and overhead. The individual knows that she can benefit more by keeping the labor cost at
the maximum amount. She also knows that reducing material cost will lead to product quality
6deterioration. The overhead cost remains fixed and cannot be altered. Further, each individual isendowed with a certain amount of money that she can allocate to material, labor, or overhead
costs, and she can derive utility only from labor cost. In this setting, each individual has to decideon the amount of money to allocate among the three product cost elements. The extent to which
the individual allocates more money to labor cost represents self-interest decision.
This raises a question regarding the method or scheme organizations should employ to motivate
individual employees to allocate resources a manner to provide as great as possible benefit forthe organizations. In this study, we will examine the efficacy of procedural fairness and successrate to alter the allocation decision. We select these variables, decribed below, because of their
theoretical importance and their common use in practice and research (see, e.g., Nahartyo 2013;
Loi et al. 2012; Lam 2011; Fudge and Schlacter 1999). For example, Nahartyo (2013) discusses
two components of procedural justice theory: self-interest theory and group value model. Loi etal. (2012) provide an explanation of why fair procedures influence employees’ feeling of
uncertainty. Lam (2011) documents the effect of longer evaluation window on the effectivenessof encouraging employees to focus on long-term rather than short-term profitability. Fudge andSchlacter (1999) offers a model based on expectancy theory to eliminate unethical practices of
employees which may hurt the long-term interests of the company.
Mitigating Effect of Procedural Fairness
The question of what motivates individual behavior in social interactions is central for a better
understanding of participative decision making. Do individuals selfishly maximize their own
material welfare, or do they take the well-being of others into account? Traditional rational
choice theory suggests that individuals are both self-interested and inequality averse (Jensen andMeckling 1976). Prior research suggests that managers, under certain conditions, exhibit myopic
behavior. That is, they choose actions that improve short-term profitability at the expense oflong term profitability (e.g., Bhojraj and Libby 2005). On the other hand, opponents of the7theory have developed arguments which explain that, even in genuine distributional problems,
individuals still hold sufficiently strong social preferences (e.g. Sauermann and Kaiser 2010;
Davis et al. 1997).
Procedural fairness represents the degree to which the processes used to make a decision are fair
(Konovsky 2000). In this study, procedural justice is defined as the extent to which the standard
costing processis judged to be fair by employees. Procedural fairness provides valuable
information to the sense making processes through which individuals develop their attitudinaland behavioral reactions to valued outcomesthey receive from organizations (Brockner 2002).
Self-interest theory of procedural justice (Thibaut and Walker 1975) asserts that procedures are
considered as fair if those affected by the outcome of the procedures have control over thedecision process. The theory suggests that in a fair situation, people may forego short-term
benefits from a relationship and focus on forthcoming advantageous outcomes in the future.
On the other hand, if the procedure is perceived as unfair, people will believe that the future
outcome is negative and they will care mostly about short-term outcomes.
Lind and Tyler (1988) provide explanation beyond self-interest theory. Their group value model
postulates that in addition to economic benefits, individuals value psychological rewards in an
economic relationship. People are predisposed to belong to social groups and that they are very
attentive to signs and symbols that communicate information about their position within groups.
The group value model suggests that people are concerned about their long-term social
relationship and do not view the relationship as a one-shot deal (Tyler 1994). This leads thepeople to be concerned with three factors: the neutrality of the decision-making procedure, trustin the groups, and evidence about social standing or status. If neutrality exists, then the decisionmaker is free from bias. People perceive the decision-makers as neutral if they create a levelplaying field for all. Trust refers to the degree to which people believe that the decision-makerintends to act in a fair manner. Standing is the position that individuals possess in a group as the8result of how the group treats them. Being treated with respect and dignity implicitly informs
one that she is a valued organizational member and furnishes a source of self-validation.
The current study measures the extent to which individuals make egocentric decision and how
procedural fairness mitigates the individuals’ inclination to act selfishly. The presence of highprocedural fairness prevents individuals from developing feelings of animosity toward theorganization and makes them more likely to accept and support the organization and its
decisions (Brockner, 2002). Specifically, high procedural justice stimulates trust in theorganization. Applied to the current study, these sensemaking perspective simply that procedural
fairness will also attenuate the individuals’ myopic behavior tendency.
In addition, uncertainty management theory relates fairness with uncertainty in the sense that
individuals tend to rely heavily on fairness information when they are confronted withuncertainty (Loi et al. 2012). According to this theory, people tend to focus on environmental
signals to reduce uncertainties and procedural fairness information is one of the most importantcues. We thus anticipate that, with higher levels of procedural fairness, individuals are willing topostpone their short-term, individual benefit in exchange for an enhanced long-term relationshipwith the organization. Acting as management team member in the standard costing process, theindividuals are expected to undergo an ethical dilemma when a cost reduction program isenacted. The study expects a mitigating effect of procedural fairness on the individuals’ selfinterest behavior once the individuals realize that the standard costing process produces cost
reduction pressure. The following hypothesis is thus proposed.
H1:

Subjects in fair procedures condition will allocate less money to labor
cost.

The Effect of Project Success Rate
Project success rate explains the project risk in gain domain. Project risk is explained withuncertainty and ambiguity. Referring to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, uncertainty is9described as doubt or a lack of sureness about someone or something. Uncertainty may range
from a falling short of certainty to an almost complete lack of conviction or knowledge especiallyabout an outcome or result. In the literature, uncertainty is subject-specific, i.e. uncertainty
resides in the eye of the beholder (Geersbro and Ritter 2010). Different individuals may havevarying degrees of perceived uncertainty in similar situation.
According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, ambiguity means something that does not have asingle clear meaning: something that is ambiguous. Ambiguity can represent in a situation inwhich something can be understood in more than one way and it is not clear which meaning is
intended. There is a controversy in understanding the concepts of uncertainty and ambiguity.
Geersbro and Ritter (2010) argue that ambiguity is not the same as uncertainty. They contend
that uncertainty is caused by lack of information, while the quality of information is the source of
ambiguity. On the other hand, a number of academics have defined ambiguity very closely to thedefinition of uncertainty. Bigus (2012) states that ambiguity implies uncertainty about theprobability that a future event will occur. This view of ambiguity focuses on the amountofinformation available which fits better with the definition of uncertainty. Ho et al. (2002) argue
that ambiguity is conceived as adding a second order probability distribution on top of theprobabilistic uncertainty in a decision under risk. Stated differently, in an ambiguous situation,
people may reason in a way analogous to how they face uncertainty. Our study adopts the latterargument and defines project success rate as the accumulation of uncertainty and ambiguity
effects in carrying out a specific process, i.e. cost reduction project.
Chang et al. (2002) propose a framework for resource allocation projects. They assert thatproject-related factors (e.g. uncertainty), decision makers’ characteristics (e.g. knowledge andexperience), and managerial environment (e.g. information asymmetry) affect managers’ resource
allocation decisions. The framework proposes that in making decisions regarding resource
allocation among different projects, managers’ subjectivity is affected by future uncertainty.The

10link between the uncertainty and individuals’ subjectivity in making decisions is critical inassessing the characteristics and effectiveness of resource allocation.
Ho et al. (2002) state that managerial decisions involving allocation of resources are affected byprobability of outcomes and ambiguity of payoffs. They find that when managers are faced withimprecise probabilities, their perceptions of the risks involved influence their choice of options.
Specifically, managers tend to choose the least ambiguous option. Tversky and Kahneman (1981)
have shown that prospect theory model can describe a value function over outcomes. The model
implies that people tend to be risk averse when they might have something to gain and to be riskprone when they might have something to lose. In relation with ambiguity, the model indicatessuch probabilistic decision weights may be affected by ambiguity. This indication is suggested
also by research findings that show how people generally avoid ambiguity in the gains domain
and are ambiguity prone in the loss domain (e.g., Cabantous 2007).
Ambiguity aversion may have an important implication: pessimism. Pessimism means that
individuals overestimate the probability of the worst outcome. With ambiguity aversion, people
tend to weigh less favorable outcomes more highly, and are, therefore, more pessimistic. For
instance, other things being equal, individuals usually prefer a 30 percent chance to a (imprecisely
defined) chance of 10–50 percent (Bigus 2012). In short, individuals prefer a certain probability
to a probability range. This implies that ambiguity aversion can be considered rational. Based on
the arguments, we expect that individuals who higher success rate (80%) will exhibit more selfinterest choice than individual who lower success rate (20-40%). Thus, the following hypothesis
is proposed.
H2:

Subjects in high success rate condition will allocate more money to labor
cost.

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The Interaction Effect of Procedural Fairness and Success rate
The procedural fairness theory suggests that people are attentive to long-term social relationshipand expect for valuable outcomes from the relationship. When they perceive procedural fairness,
individuals may delay short-term advantage in exchange for long-term gain. Moreover, when
individuals deal with an uncertain decision environment, they depend on information aboutprocedural fairness, to reduce the uncertainty level, in coming to a decision. In organizationalsettings, the perception that one has been treated fairly leads to a variety of prosocial
consequences, such as higher commitment to organizations and institutions, more extrarole
citizenship behavior, greater likelihood of conflict prevention and resolution (Van den Bos and
Lind 2004). As also discussed in previous section, we expect that procedural fairness perception
will lead to individuals’ lower inclination to self-interest decisions.
Expectancy theory asserts that motivation is a function of individuals’ perceptions of theirenvironment (Fudge and Schlacter 1999). In particular to this proposed study, there are threeimportant factors in this theory: effort-performance expectancy, performance-outcome
expectancy, and valence. The first concerns the individual’s perception that effort is positively
correlated with level of performance. The second concerns a person’s expectations that the
rewards she will receive are closely tied to her level of performance. Valence relates to the degree
to which an individual values a particular reward. The more a person values the reward she will
receive for her effort, the more motivated she will be to receive the reward. Rewards for whichpeople generally havea high valence include salaries, bonuses, promotions, and recognition.
Hence, in the proposed research, we expect that high certainty/low ambiguity (i.e. low successrate) will encourage individuals to pursue a projects that decreases current benefit but potentiallyhave positive future payoffs.
The extant motivation literature reveals that the pursuit of personally constructed goals involves
maintenance of positive self-regard, whereas striving for socially constructed goals involves
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identification with role obligations at work (e.g., Chen et al. 2009). Personal goals may not havehigh social value and are not necessarily subject to consistent expectations from others. On thecontrary, social goals are generally accorded with expectations from others and have high social
value. Hence, we infer that the consideration of social preferences considerably adds explanatory
power to rational predictions of behavior in standard costing decisions. Both self-interest andsocial obligation motivate individual behavior in such decision making.
Taken together, the theories discussed above imply that individuals who perceive fair procedural
condition and are exposed to a high likelihood of future advantage will be more likely to behave
in a less self-interest manner. The related hypothesis is thus proposed as follows.
H3:

Higher procedural fairness perception and lower success rate will lead toless money allocated to labor cost.

3.

MethodLaboratory experiments provide for an excellent method to empirically investigate individual
decision process in standard costing. Due to real-world complexity, an empirical test with fielddata bears the major problem that it ishardly possible to control for all possible causal influences.
Participants and Design
The participants are 136 undergraduate business students at three large private universities inJava, Indonesia. Participation are solicited through electronic as well as printed media. The
participants are randomly assigned to one of four between-subjects treatment conditions. We
obtain the four between subjects treatment conditions by fully crossing two group procedural
fairness conditions with two group success rates. First, we assign participants to one of two
procedural fairness conditions (fair and unfair conditions). Second, we assign participants to one
of two group success rates (low and high success rates) in gain domain. Finally, participants in all
four between-subjects conditions complete an experimental task and the entire experiment via
computer. Figure 1 below shows the entire cells.
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Figure 1
Experimental Design

Project success rate

Low
High

Procedural Fairness Conditions
Fair
UnfairCell 1
Cell 2Cell 3Cell 4

Cell1: Fair condition, low risk
Cell 2: Unfair condition, low risk
Cell 3: Fair condition, high risk
Cell 4: Unfair condition, high risk

Procedure
The experimental procedure comprises 6 steps (Figure 2):
1. We set up the computer lab with a predesigned software and when participants arrive, we
randomly assign them to computer terminals.
2. The first few computer screens explain the participants’ role and task. Each participant
act as a manager in production department in a medium size furniture factory. Their task
is to determine a standard cost in the department. The software is designed to be
attractive and informative enough to assist the role and task internalization. A number ofquestions are asked to ensure the participants understand their role and task and its
requirements.
3. We inform participants that they will earn “dollar” during the experimental task and thateach dollar will be converted to raffle tickets at the rate of one ticket per dollar. At theconclusion of the experiment, the participants receive their tickets. The tickets are drawn
to select four winners. Each winner receives 500 thousand rupiahs.
4. The next computer screens describe the experimental task. Participants complete anexperimental task which consists of two stages. At the first stage, participants is informedthat they are to determine a standard cost for a particular product. We inform theparticipants that they can allocate 2,400 dollars to three cost components: material, labor,
and overhead. There are three choices of material and its costs: high quality material with14

the highest cost (900-1,000 dollars), moderate quality material with modest cost (700-899
dollars), and low quality material with the lowest cost (300-699 dollars). The maximum
amount of labor cost is set at 1,000 dollars. Participants are informed that they will
receive the entire labor cost as their payment at the end of the experiment. The overhead
cost is set fixed at the amount of 500 dollars. Participants are unable to change theoverhead cost.
5. At the second stage, we inform participants that due to market changes, the company
should reduce its production cost to 2,000 dollars. Now it is up to the participants
whether they will reduce the material cost, labor cost, or both. In the fair procedure
condition, we tell participants that their colleagues (other managers) are willing to reducelabor cost and maintain the quality of material at the maximum level. In addition, we also
tell them the amount of cost reduction proposed by each manager in detail. In the unfair
procedure condition, we tell the participants that the other managers will reduce theproduction cost but without the detail of the cost reduction. In the low-risk project
condition, we inform the participants that the probability of success of the cost reduction
project is 80 percent. In the high-risk project condition, we tell the participants that theprobability of success is between 20 to 40 percent. Manipulation checks are administeredthroughout the treatment processes.
6. Next, the participants are to determine the money allocation to the cost elements. Uponcompleting the task, participants answer an exit-questionnaire. Last, we calculate
participants payments (in form of raffle tickects to be drawn). We announce theparticipants who win the prizes soon after all experiment sessions completed.

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Measures
We examine resource allocation for our dependent variable and fairness (fair and unfair
conditions) and success rate (high and low) for our independent variables. Low success rates is20-40% success rate and high success rate 80% success rate.
4.

Results

Test indicates no significant difference across the allocation resources between group and withingroup for any following variables: age, GPA, gender and grade. We use One Way Anova to test
homogeneity of experiment cell and show that all of demography characteristic is homogeny(table 1).
Table 1. Homogeneity Test

Gender

Age

GPA

Grade

Sum ofSquares

Df

Mean
SquareF

Sig

Between Groups

2.398

9

0.266

1.227

0.284

Within Groups

27.366

126

0.217

Total

29.765135

Between Groups

2.404

9

0.267

0.774

0.640

Within Groups

43.478

126

0.345

Total

45.882135

Between Groups

3.145

9

0.349

0.766

0.648

Within Groups

57.495

126

0.456

Total

60.640135

Between Groups

15.243

9

1.694

0.736

0.675

Within Groups

289.786

126

2.300

Total

305.029135

We also test the disturbance factor that may influence the labor cost allocation decision. The
factor that may influence the decision is level of understanding of cost accounting. We test withseven questions of cost accounting and each of question have score 20. Ancova test withindependent variable fairness and success rate, covariate variable is score of understanding of
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cost accounting show in table 2. The Ancova test indicates that score of understanding of costaccounting is 0.730. It means that there is no influence level of understanding of cost accounting
in decision of labor cost.
Table 2. Result of Ancova

Independent Variable

Type III Sum
of Squares

Df

Mean Square

F

Sig.

Fairness

236,780.413

1236,780.413

11.3160.001

Success rate

115,219.762

1

115,219.762

5.507

0.020

2,502.539

12,502.539

0.120

0.730

Score of understanding
cost accounting

Hypotheses Test
Mitigating Effect of Procedural Fairness
Hypothesis 1 state that subjects in fair procedures condition will allocate less money to laborcost. Independent-t test comparing participant decision with fairness procedure and participant
decision with unfair procedures. The results were reported in table 2.
Table 2 Hypothesis 1 Test

Procedural
FairnessN

Mean

Std. dev

Fair

67

598.51

153.24

Unfair69

681.16141.71

Independent ttest
F=0.02p=0.965
t= -3.267
p=0.001

Independent t-test indicate that labor cost that were determined participants in fair group were598.51 and labor cost that were determined participants in unfair group were 681.16. There weresignificant difference (p= 0.001) and the hypotheses 1 was supported. Subject that received
information preference from another production manager that choose high material quality
would determine labor cost lower than subject that no information from another production
17

manager. That information indicates that fairness have a significant role to mitigating manager
self-interest. This result supported traditional rational choice theory that individual tend to selfinterest and hope to get highest incentive (Jensen and Meckling, 1976). Individual will get thebenefit to himself in short time (Bhojraj and Libby 2005) and ignore goal of organization in longterm.
Fairness procedural treatment was information that another manager choice best material quality
and this situation encourage participants develops attitudinal reaction and behavior on value oforganization (Brocker 2002). This result supported Konovsky (2000) that procedural fairness
indicates that decision making process is fair. The result also conform Thibaut and Walker(1975) that fair procedure if was influenced outcome of procedure that controlled decision
making process and ignore short term interest and focus to interest forward. If feel unfair
procedure, individual will trust forward outcome is negative and focus on short time outcome.
The Effect of Project Success Rate
Hypothesis 2 predicts that subjects in high success rate condition will allocate more money tolabor cost. The results with independent t-test were reported in table 3.
Table 3. Test of Hypotheses 2

Project success
rate

N

Mean

Std dev

High

68

669.12167.74Low

68

611.76131.05

Independent ttest
F=4.544p=0.035t= 2.222
p=0.028

Table 3 presents the independent t-test results that mean of labor cost for high success rate was669.12 and mean of labor cost for low success rate was 611.76. The difference of two groupshows that probability was 0.028 and hypotheses two were supported. This result conform
prospect theory of Tversky and Kahneman (1981) that stated individual will tend to avoid risk if

18there was in gain domain and will take a risk if there was in loss domain. This research usedsuccess rate (high and low) in gain domain. In high rate shows that the success rate of project
was 80% and in low rate shows that the success rate of project was 20-40%.
This research indicate that managerial decision to allocate production cost to labor cost andmaterial cost with fixed overhead cost were influenced with outcomes and ambiguity of
incentives that were received. This result conform Ho, Keller and Keltyka (2002). Participantsthat have a role as manager get choice to take high incentive but must sacrifice high quality andambiguity to make decision-making. This result also support Cabantus (2007) that statedindividual generally avoid ambiguity in gain domain and feel ambiguity in loss domain.
The Interaction Effect of Procedural Fairness and Project Success Rate
Hypotheses 3 stated that higher procedural fairness perception and lower success ratewould lead to less money allocated to labor cost. The interaction test with Two Way
Anova was reported in table 4. Probability value of fairness was 0.001 and risk was
0.018, but the interaction show probability 0.192 (not significant). The results indicatethat there is no interaction effect of procedural fairness and success rate.
Table 4. Interaction Effect Test
EffectDF

Type III SS

Mean Square

F-Value

Prob > F

Fairness

1

247,352.941

247,352.941

11.9650.001*

Risk

1

117,647.059

117,647.059

5.691

0.018**

Fairness * Risk

1

35,588.235

Error

132

2,728,823.529

0.192*significance at 1%**significance at 5%This result didn’t support fairness procedural theory, when individual decision depend
on success rate, although in partial test show that fairness and success rate influence19

decision making. Individual decision making more attentive to long term social
relationship and expectation to get outcome did not influenced success rate.
Conclusion
This research provides empirical evidence that procedural fairness influences theparticipant decision making, so in fairness condition, participants focus on high material
quality comparing with incentive that determined from labor cost. This research also
support that higher success rate, the decision making to allocate labor cost tend to selfinterest with choice high labor cost. However, this research does not support theinteraction effect of procedural fairness and success rate. Future research could provide
additional effect on issues examine in this paper. First, we made specific choice forsuccess rate (low and high) for gain domain (success rate), future research could
examined the sensitivity of our results with affective response like Moreno et al (2002).
The affective respond measure how they feel conflict when choose labor cost that
impact in their incentive or high material quality. Second, the future research can extend
with success rate in gain and loss domain. Third, future research could examine with
two-employee groups and use single decision that impact in incentive group and will
conform Fisher, Peffer and Sprinkle (2005). They argue that employee shirking could
increase within larger groups.

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APPENDIX
Experimental Test Instruments
Available at simulasi.eksperimen.net
Profil Participants
Name:
Gender:Age:
Grade:
University:
Department:
Level:
GPA:
Email:
Hand phone:
Profil Cemara Indonesia Furniture Company- Picture (vision, mission, product, exhibition, organization structure
Role and Task
Your role is a production manager of Cemara Indonesia Furniture Co.
Your task is allocating labor cost and material cost of job order costing.
Production cost consists of:
1. Material cost
2. Labor cost
3. Overhead cost
Prime cost = Material cost + Labor Cost
Conversion cost= Labor cost + Overhead Cost
Instruction
The value of labor cost determines your incentive.
23

Your incentives will convert with coupon ticket (1 dollar = 1 ticket) and get opportunity to win
prison total IDR 2 Million for 4 participants.
If you determine higher labor cost, your incentive is higher to.
Incentives
You will get incentive:
1. 20,000 IDR hand phone voucher
2. Opportunity to win prisons total IDR 2 Million.
Check Manipulation 1 & Test of Cost Accounting(if the first answer correct, score 20, if the first answer wrong then choose again and correct, score 10, if the first and second answer wrong thenchoose again and correct, score 5). The total score influence the incentive and will convert to coupon and get opportunity to win total IDR 2
million).

1. Your position are …
a. Human resource manager
b. Production manager
c. Marketing manager
2. Your task in that position is…
a. Determine time of production
b. Determine cost production
c. Determine labor time
3. The component of cost production is…
a. Material cost + direct labor cost+ overhead costb. Indirect material+ material cost+ overhead costc. Direct labor cost+ material cost+ indirect labor cost
4. Prime cost consists of component…
a. Direct labor cost + indirect labor costb. Direct labor cost+ overhead costc. Direct labor cost + material cost
5. Conversion cost consists of component…
a. Direct labor cost + indirect labor costb. Direct labor cost+ overhead costc. Direct labor cost + material cost
6. Electricity cost is a component of…
a. Material costb. Administration costc. Overhead cost
7. If material cost is $50, direct labor cost $100 and overhead cost $25, determines prime
cost!
a. $150
b. $125c. $75
8. If material cost is $50, direct labor cost $100 and overhead cost $25, determines
production cost!
a. $150
b. $175
c. $125
9. If sales $500, cost of goods sold $200, determine gross profit!
a. $200
b. $300
c. $700
10. The component of cost of goods sold include cost element below, except…
24

a. Beginning inventoryb. Ending inventoryc. SalesEmail from Head of Production Division (for all groups)
To: <participants>
Subject : Job Order No 2324.
Determine production cost for job order No 2324 (living), order from Mr. Michael (USA).
Mr. Michael is potential buyer Cemara Indonesia Furniture and that order will distributed as
hotel interior in USA.
You must determine production cost NOT MORE THAN $2,400.
Your incentive in DOLLAR based on labor cost that you choose.
Remember:Higher labor cost, higher your incentive.
ALLOCATION OF PRODUCTION COST
Determine production cost for job order No 2324, NOT MORE than $2,400.
Choose material cost and direct labor cost.
Overhead cost is fixed ($500)
Material Cost
100
200

300

400

500

600

700

800

900

1000

Labor Cost
100
200

300

400

500

600

700

800

900

1000

Incentives total……………..(computer will otomatically input)
Check of manipulation 2
1. What is the value of job order No 2324 from Mr. Michael that you determined?
a. $2,500
b. $2,400
c. $2,000
2. You get incentive based on decision of…
a. Material costb. Labor costc. Overhead cost
3. What is the value of overhead cost (fixed) for job order No 2324?
a. $300
b. $200
c. $500
25

Email from Head of Production (Fair & Unfair)
Mr . Michael had offered the lower production cost from our competitor.
If we want to win the competition, please determine production cost Job order 2324 NOT
MORE than $2,000.
Additional information if fair
Other production manager decide to:
1. Choose highest material cost
2. Decrease labor cost
We estimate that success rate Mr. Michael order project is 20-40% (high risk).
We estimate that success rate Mr. Michael order project is 80% (low risk).
ALLOCATION OF PRODUCTION COST
Determine production cost for job order No 2324, NOT MORE than $2,000.
Choose material cost and direct labor cost.
Overhead cost is fixed ($500)
Remember:
Success rate of this project is 20-40%
Success rate of this project is 80%
Material Cost
100
200

300

400

500

600

700

800

900

1000

Labor Cost
100
200

300

400

500

600

700

800

900

1000

Manipulation Check 2
1. You must decide production cost not more than…
a. $2,000
b. $2,500
c. $3,000
2. What is the success rate of this project?
a. 20-40%
b. 60%
c. 80%
3. Information from head of production choose to..
a. Highest material qualityb. There is not information about option of another production manager
c. Marketing***26