Ethical leadership plays a major role in school administration while transactional
and transformational leadership styles have been known to be effective in an
organizational setting. However, the latter styles have also been linked to unethical
behavior. The research problem for this study tested the possibility that transactional and
transformation leadership behavior would lead to unethical leadership behavior among
school administrators. The study, which was quantitative, nonexperimental, and ex post
facto in nature, was aimed at evaluating the major facets of ethical, transactional, and
transformational leadership styles. The literature reviewed did not support a possible link
between the three leadership styles being studied. The Multifactor Leadership
Questionnaire and the Ethical Leadership Scale were used to determine the relationship.
The omnibus hypothesis was tested using a statistical model based on multiple
regressions utilizing a probability sample attained through random sampling. Data were
collected through a survey of 729 participants consisting of principals, assistant principals
and school administrators from an independent school district in the southwestern United
States. The statistical analysis of the data collected was conducted using SPSS 20.0
ฃsoftware. The ANOVA regression model revealed that at least one of the transactional or
transformational variables was linked to ethical leadership behavior. The findings backed
literature review results that no marked relationship existed between the attributes of
transformational leadership and the ethical leadership behavior of school administrators.
However, a significant and positive correlation was noted between the idealized
behaviors of transformational leadership and ethical leadership behaviors of school
administrators. When the intensity of transformational leadership behavior increased,
there was a substantial rise in ethical leadership behavior. However, there was no sizable
link between the inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation, contingent reward, and
management-by-exception behaviors of transformational leadership and the ethical
leadership behavior of the sample base. To summarize, while transformational leadership
attributes were not linked to ethical leadership behavior of school administrators,
transformational leadership behaviors showed a significant relationship in the same
context