The effects of reasons given for ineligibility on perceived gender discrimination and feelings of injustice

We examine whether the reason given for a negative outcome influences the likelihood of making gender discrimination attributions. Men and women were given one of four reasons for their ineligibility to attend an event: an explicit gender reason, a reason based on an attribute correlated with gender, that same gender-related reason with explanatory information attached, or they were given no reason. Providing participants with a reason based on a gender-related attribute deflected them from making attributions to gender discrimination, indicating that discrimination attributions can easily be averted. Adding explanatory information to the gender-related reason decreased feelings of injustice, illegitimacy and anger while increasing acceptance of the outcome.