Often a limited or solipsistic perspective hinders an individual's ability to make ethical decisions and act in an ethically responsible way. Solipsism refers to a self-involved or self-centered perspective on the world; that is, everything in the world relating to a single individual. Such a limited perspective presents an obstacle to ethical decision-making by preventing an individual from adequately understanding, analyzing and evaluating all the potential agents that are involved in or could be affected by that individual's decision.
A limited perspective relates to self-interest in that the individual in question only chooses to focus on how the world relates back to him. The two differ, however, in the degree to which self-interested decisions drive the decision-making process. An individual with a limited perspective might decide to drink the last cup of coffee because he doesn't know that his coworker was saving it, while a self-interested person would drink the last cup simply because he wants it regardless of his coworker's interest. Self-interest presents an obstacle to ethical decision-making by motivating an individual to make potentially unethical decisions in spite of the wishes of others.
While those with a limited and self-interested perspective make decisions for different reasons, both make active decisions. Individuals that lack ethical interest, however, abstain from making ethical decisions, which can often manifest as unethical inactivity. For example, in the face of coffee theft, an individual that lacks any ethical interest might simply watch the theft take place without responding or acting in any way. This inactivity represents complicity in the unethical act, while the simple act of notifying coworkers or even attempting to intervene in some way represents an ethical stance in response to an unethical act. Lack of interest presents an obstacle to ethical decision-making by eliminating an individual's ability to respond to unethical acts in an ethical way.
In some cases, individuals act in a way that they believe takes the perspectives of others in mind, but is still unethical. In some cases, these individuals make decisions they believe to be ethical based on faulty or erroneous information. For example, upon finding an empty pot of coffee, a coworker might confront his colleague and accuse her of coffee theft. The confrontation, intended to indicate disapprobation of coffee theft, is itself an ethical act. However, when the accused colleague responds that it was not her, but someone else that stole the coffee, the act transforms into an unethical accusation based on ignorance. Ignorance presents an obstacle to ethical decision-making by providing the decision-maker with faulty information that in turn guides his decision-making process.