| Summary: | A study was conducted to analyze self-reported happiness and neural responses to fair and unfair offers while controlling for monetary payoff. Data were obtained from two ultimatum game experiments undertaken to examine the emotional response related to fair treatment. Findings revealed that fair offers triggered higher happiness ratings and activation in several reward regions of the brain than did unfair offers of equal monetary value; the propensity to accept unfair proposals was linked to increased activity in right ventrolateral prefrontal cortex, a region involved in emotion regulation, and with decreased activity in the anterior insula, which has been implicated in negative affect. Findings also revealed that fairness is hedonically valued, and tolerating unfair treatment for material gain entails a pattern of activation resembling suppression of negative affect. Findings are discussed in detail.
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