One source of moral failure in group life stems from people
deviating from moral requirements to help their group
attain its goals. A number of factors contribute to the
confidence people have in the moral permissibility of the
means they employ to achieve their group’s goals, such as
the importance they place on those goals (Hoyt et al. 2010;
Price 2006). Another important factor that can influence
this moral decision making is the extent to which people
define themselves in terms of their relations with others, or
the extent of their interdependent self-construal. The literature suggests that people with high, as opposed to low,
interdependent self-construal show an enhanced concern
for justice in their interactions with others (Gollwitzer and
Bucklein 2007; Van Prooijen and Van den Bos 2009).
However, the extent to which this component of the selfconcept influences the ethical decision making process is
likely influenced by one’s role in the group. In this
research, we merge social role and self-construal perspectives, and test the prediction that the influence of selfconstrual in determining group-based ethical decision
making will be weaker for those in a leader role relative to
those in a non-leading member role