Self-construal refers to how individuals define the self as independent from others or interdependent with others, and has been shown to affect several domain of social cognition, affect and behavior. Indeed, interdependent self construal seems to promote pro-social behavior, possibly by increasing similarity in self-other processing and it is associated with increased concern with collective outcomes. Here, we aim to explore how self-construal shape perception and behavior in interpersonal and collective (societal) contexts. At the interpersonal level, we aim to investigate whether: 1) the tendency to define the self as independent might result in lower propensity to trust others; 2) this relationship may be moderated by the experience of self-other merging resulting from a novel procedure (IMS) able to blur the distinction between self and other; and 3) manipulating self construal may causally affect this relationship. At the societal level, we aim to test whether measured and induced Interdependent self-construal could promote tax compliance through three potential mediators: tax morale, trust, and self-regulation.
By combining the expertise of social psychologists and neuroscientists skilled to the study of economic psychology, social decision making, plasticity of self and other representations, we believe the present project may contribute to the progress of the state of the art in several ways. First, counteracting the detrimental effect of independent self construal on interpersonal trust by means of simple experimental manipulation (IMS) might provide a groundbreaking methodology to affect and improve social relationship. Then, by showing the effect of situationally induced interdependent self on trust and tax compliance (and the factors mediating these effects), it will be possible to develop and test applied strategies in all the contexts in which interpersonal trust and willingness to contribute to a collective good is needed.
This project will contribute to the progress of the state of the art in several ways.
First, it will expand literature concerning the impact of self-construal by examining its behavioural consequences in two areas not yet systematically studied such as interpersonal trust and propensity to tax compliance.
These behavioural domains have been extensively explored by behavioural economics and economic psychology, but have not received the deserved attention by social and cognitive psychology. Even though self-construal theory has a strong tradition in research concerning the different impact of independent and interdependent self-construal on pro-social behaviour (Karremans, Van Lange, & Holland, 2005; Van Lange, 1999), and on proneness to sacrifice self-interests in favour of other¿s benefits (Gardner et al., 2004), no study has yet tested whether different self-construal may have opposite effects when people have to take the risk of trusting others within economic social decision making contexts, or when people have to decide whether to be honest or not when filling in their tax return.
By providing evidence that people situationally primed with interdependent (vs. independent) self views are more inclined to trust others and to pay taxes, it will be possible to develop and test applied strategies to increment salience of interdependent self in all the contexts in which interpersonal trust and willingness to contribute to a collective good is needed.
Second, this project will contribute to uncover the psychological processes that mediate and moderate the impact of self-construal on interpersonal trust and tax compliance. The first sub-line of research, in particular, will explore an innovative way to counteract the, potentially, detrimental effect of independent self construal on interpersonal trust, that is Interpersonal Multisensory Stimulation (IMS). While IMS should not (or minimally) affect interdependent individuals who already have very inclusive identities, it should promote broader inclusivity and self-other overlap in individuals who do not express such tendencies such as those with independent-self view. If the expected results were supported empirically, this would constitute a groundbreaking methodology to affect and improve social relationship.
The second sub-line of research holds great innovative potential because it will focus on processes mediating the association between self construal and tax compliance. By doing this, we will not limit our analysis to the main finding (self-construal and tax compliance) but we will examine and compare several relevant processes and we will be able to shed light on which of these mediators is more influential and should be considered as the most important one.
Beyond the theoretical interest of confirming the hypothesized mediations and moderations, we believe that even the study of the relationship between self-construal and tax morale, trust in authorities, and self control and its interaction with IMS would significantly enrich literature concerning self-construal.