A Comparison of Emotional Consequences of and Changes in Equity Over Time Using Global and Domain-Specific Measures of Equity

A sample of romantic partners completed several measures of perceived equity in regard to their relationship, at multiple times over almost five years. Three of the measures were one-item global assessments and one measure was detailed and based on Foa and Foa's (1974) classification of resources. The measures were compared on descriptive properties (e.g., percentage of participants who chose the equity category), their degree of association with the other equity measures, and the results obtained for two research questions: What is the association between equity/inequity and specific emotional reactions? How does equity change with the passage of time? The major findings were that partners tended to agree in their perceptions of equity, inequity was more common in the domain of money than in other resource areas, equity in the service domain was more highly associated with overall equity judgments for both men and women than was equity in other relationship domains, underbenefiting inequity but not overbenefiting inequity was associated with overall distress experienced as a result of exchange, and perceptions of equity remained generally stable over time. Although the different equity measures yielded some different findings, there were more similarities than differences.