Indigenous Proverb Priming and Distributive Justice in Kenyan Cooperative Savings Groups: A Lab-in-the-Field Experiment on Norm Accessibility and Contribution Enforcement

Kenyan cooperative savings groups rely on shared norms of reciprocity and distributive justice, yet the psychological mechanisms that make these norms accessible and enforceable remain poorly understood. A total of 480 members of savings groups in Kiambu County were randomly assigned to one of three priming conditions: a proverb prime, a neutral prime, or a no-prime control. Norm accessibility was measured through response latencies on a lexical decision task, and contribution enforcement was operationalised as the amount deducted from low contributors by group vote. Proverb-primed participants demonstrated significantly faster recognition of norm-related words and allocated higher punishment to free-riders than did controls. The effect of priming on punishment was mediated by norm accessibility, and this mediation was stronger among participants who reported high trust in their group. These findings suggest that indigenous proverbs function as culturally embedded cues that activate distributive justice norms and facilitate costly enforcement, offering a psychological account of how cooperative institutions sustain contribution in the absence of formal sanctions.