Matthias Uhl

University of Hohenheim · Faculty of BusinessEconomics and Social Sciences

Artificial intelligence (AI)-based decision support systems hold promise for enhancing diagnostic accuracy and efficiency in computational pathology. However, human-AI collaboration can introduce and amplify cognitive biases, such as confirmation bias caused by false confirmation when erroneous human opinions are reinforced by inaccurate AI output....

External shocks (e.g., due to a pandemic) may lead to price jumps in the short term. Rather than being read as a signal of increased scarcity, the resulting “price gouging” is often ascribed to sellers’ selfish exploitation of the crisis. In our experimental study, we investigate the drivers of fairness perceptions regarding voluntary transactions...

In a representative vignette study in Germany with 1,653 respondents, we investigated laypeople’s attribution of moral responsibility in collaborative medical diagnosis. Specifically, we compare people’s judgments in a setting in which physicians are supported by an AI-based recommender system to a setting in which they are supported by a human col...

How would people distribute risks of autonomous vehicles (AVs) in everyday road traffic? The rich literature on the ethics of autonomous vehicles (AVs) revolves around moral judgments in unavoidable collision scenarios. We argue for extending the debate to driving behaviors in everyday road traffic where ubiquitous ethical questions arise due to th...

There is an ongoing debate about genetic engineering (GE) in food production. Supporters argue that it makes crops more resilient to stresses, such as drought or pests, and should be considered by researchers as a technology to address issues of global food security, whereas opponents put forward that GE crops serve only the economic interests of t...

Preferences often change—even in short time intervals—due to either the mere passage of time (present-biased preferences) or changes in visceral or environmental conditions (state-dependent preferences). On the basis of empirical findings concerning state-dependent preferences, we critically discuss the “Aristotelian” view of unitary decision maker...

Unlabelled: A growing gap is emerging between the supply of and demand for professional caregivers, not least because of the ever-increasing average age of the world's population. One strategy to address this growing gap in many regions is the use of care robots. Although there have been numerous ethical debates about the use of robots in nursing...

ChatGPT is not only fun to chat with, but it also searches information, answers questions, and gives advice. With consistent moral advice, it can improve the moral judgment and decisions of users. Unfortunately, ChatGPT’s advice is not consistent. Nonetheless, it does influence users’ moral judgment, we find in an experiment, even if they know they...

Internal whistleblowing systems are supposed to fight misconduct within organizations. Because it is difficult to study their efficacy in the field, scientific evidence on their performance is rare. This is problematic, because these systems bind substantial resources and might generate the erroneous impression of compliance in a company in which m...

Moral luck refers to whether an actor is morally praised or blamed for an action whose outcome they could not influence. In two studies, we investigated the behavioral importance of this phenomenon in the realm of investments, which has become increasingly subject to ethical evaluations. In our first online experiment, we examined whether people’s...

ChatGPT is not only fun to chat with, but it also searches information, answers questions, and gives advice. With consistent moral advice, it might improve the moral judgment and decisions of users, who often hold contradictory moral beliefs. Unfortunately, ChatGPT turns out highly inconsistent as a moral advisor. Nonetheless, it influences users'...

In behavioral economics, intrapersonal conflict is predominantly interpreted hierarchically. A “present-biased” intrapersonal doer may spoil the goal of a rational planner. This often suggests paternalistic interventions that help the “true” or “authentic” self to overwhelm its present-biased alter ego. Game theorist Schelling proposed a reciprocal...

The human in the loop is often advocated as a panacea against concerns about AI-powered machines, which increasingly take decisions of consequence in all realms of life. However, can we rely on humans to prevent unethical decisions by machines? We run online experiments modeling both the case where the machine serves as a corrective to the human an...

Is the ethics of autonomous vehicles (AVs) restricted to weighing lives in unavoidable accidents? We argue that AVs distribute risks between road users in regular traffic situations, either explicitly or implicitly. This distribution of risks raises ethically relevant questions that cannot be evaded by simple heuristics such as "hitting the brakes....

The transfer of tasks with sometimes far-reaching implications to autonomous systems raises a number of ethical questions. In addition to fundamental questions about the moral agency of these systems, behavioral issues arise. We investigate the empirically accessible question of whether the imposition of harm by an agent is systematically judged di...

We explore aversion to the use of algorithms in moral decision-making. So far, this aversion has been explained mainly by the fear of opaque decisions that are potentially biased. Using incentivized experiments, we study which role the desire for human discretion in moral decision-making plays. This seems justified in light of evidence suggesting t...

Departing from the claim that AI needs to be trustworthy, we find that ethical advice from an AI-powered algorithm is trusted even when its users know nothing about its training data and when they learn information about it that warrants distrust. We conducted online experiments where the subjects took the role of decision-makers who received advic...

Traditional ethics tends to belittle the system performance of markets as it mainly focuses on individual virtues. In this respect, criticisms of the market society and of the digital society are similar. Like individuals in markets, algorithms do not take ethically relevant decisions with moral intentions. Their application can nevertheless lead t...

We address the considerations of the European Commission Expert Group on the ethics of connected and automated vehicles regarding data provision in the event of collisions. While human drivers’ appropriate post-collision behavior is clearly defined, regulations for automated driving do not provide for collision detection. We agree it is important t...

Some criticize the data-driven study of driverless car ethics for relying on deterministic crash scenarios where the focus should be on minimizing the occurrence of accidents instead. Indeed, decisions in road traffic are taken in the domain of risk. A relevant ethical question is, however, whether autonomous vehicles should actually minimize an ac...

Ethically, it is debatable whether we may program autonomous systems (AS) to actively impose harm on some to avoid greater harm for others. Responses to surveys on ethical dilemmas in the programming of self-driving cars have shown that people favor to impose harm on some people to save others from suffering and are consequently willing to sacrific...

Departing from the assumption that AI needs to be transparent to be trusted, we find that users trustfully take ethical advice from a transparent and an opaque AI-powered algorithm alike. Even when transparency reveals information that warns against the algorithm, they continue to accept its advice. We conducted online experiments where the partici...

In the current landscape of management and business ethics scholarship, a prominent type of dissimulation is exemplified by corporate hypocrisy. The concept of corporate hypocrisy brings traditional morality to bear on the institutions of the modern society and thereby emphasizes the contested relationship between the research programs of individua...

In an increasingly globalized world, business ethics continues to gain importance as a field of study. This book provides a comprehensive overview of the essential concepts of business ethics related to the economy as a whole, as well as more closely understood corporate ethics related to the individual company. In contrast to more casuistic works...

Society increasingly demands ethical motives from investors. Like other judgments, however, the moral evaluation of investments can be influenced by stereotypes. We investigate whether subjects’ evaluation of investments as immoral violates the commonly accepted principle of moral impartiality—the view that moral evaluations of actions must not dep...

Hypocrisy is the act of claiming moral standards to which one’s own behavior does not conform. Instances of hypocrisy, such as the supposedly green furnishing group IKEA’s selling of furniture made from illegally felled wood, are frequently reported in the media. In a controlled and incentivized experiment, we investigate how observers rate differe...

Over the years, business ethics has become an established discipline, which is taught in many business schools around the globe, often as a mandatory class. But its success reaches far beyond being an academic subject. Throughout the corporate world, and despite undisputable delays, sometimes mere lip service and real setbacks, business ethics, tog...

This chapter clarifies the most fundamental concepts of business ethics. Business ethics problems are characterized as interaction problems emerging from the interdependence of at least two actors. The problem of scarcity and the limits of individual moral action are introduced: business ethics starts where individually virtuous behavior cannot sol...

This chapter introduces the most important interdisciplinary foundations and tools of business ethics. First, the authors discuss the philosophical foundations and concepts. The most important normative ethical theories, the notion of a reflective equilibrium, and several tools for justifying norms under dissent are introduced. Second, economic and...

Preferences often change -- even in short time intervals -- due to either the mere passage of time (present-biased preferences) or changes in environmental conditions (state-dependent preferences). On the basis of the empirical findings in the context of state-dependent preferences, we critically discuss the Aristotelian view of unitary decision ma...

The transfer of tasks with sometimes far-reaching moral implications to autonomous systems raises a number of ethical questions. In addition to fundamental questions about the moral agency of these systems, behavioral issues arise. This article focuses on the responsibility of agents who decide on our behalf. We investigate the empirically accessib...

Innovation requires creative ideas, which are both original and useful. Usefulness is crucial for ideas to be implemented and turn into innovation. We examine how performance evaluation helps balance both dimensions. In a laboratory experiment, creators generate words, which users and jurors rate for creativity. Users use the words to write texts,...

We experimentally test Hume’s hypothesis that people underappreciate the value of cooperation-enforcing institutions in impersonal interactions by relying on personal trust. Subjects played a game in groups of two or six. Each subject could defect at any time, leaving the others with zero payoff by unilaterally appropriating an amount of money that...

We investigated money burning after tournaments. First, we show that substantial money burning was triggered if participants perceived a situation as competitive. Second, we investigated to which extent aggression between former contestants was motivated by preemptive retaliation or spite. To disentangle both motives, we introduced a credible and v...

Teaching experiments are valuable when it comes to sensitizing students for a business ethics that addresses the behavior of agents in modern societies. Many students are coined by the often predominantly individualistic ethical reasoning that they are accustomed to from their living environments. In our classes, we confront them with the volatilit...

Ethics is a field in which the gap between words and actions looms large. Game theory and the empirical methods it inspires look at behavior instead of the lip service people sometimes pay to norms. We believe that this special issue comprises several illustrations of the fruitful application of this approach to ethics.

The introduction of ever more capable autonomous systems is moving at a rapid pace. The technological progress will enable us to completely delegate to machines processes that were once a prerogative for humans. Progress in fields like autonomous driving promises huge benefits on both economical and ethical scales. Yet, there is little research tha...

Voluntary agreements in which competitors commit to common goals are important tools for corporate social responsibility. After entering into a commitment, however, competitors often have incentives to behave opportunistically. This is possible because voluntary agreements are not enforced by external sanctions. We present the results of an explora...

We examine whether people are more honest in public than in private. In a laboratory experiment, we have subjects roll dice and report outcomes either in public or in private. Higher reports yield more money and lies cannot be detected. We also elicit subjects’ ethical mindsets and their expectations about others’ reports. We find that outcome-mind...

Instructions. Written instructions for the experiment. (PDF)

Data. Data of the experiment as comma-separated values. (CSV)

We elicit punishment after competition. Our experiment creates a setting in which winners and losers are assigned in a pairwise speed-based calculation task. As in Abbink and Sadrieh’s (2009) joy-of-destruction game punishment is executed by burning parts of another participant’s endowment. We manipulate the target of punishment to investigate whet...

In this chapter, we present supporting arguments for the claim that Order Ethics is a school of thought within ethics which is especially open to empirical evidence. With its focus on order frameworks, i.e., incentive structures, Order Ethical advice automatically raises questions on implementability, efficacy, and efficiency of such recommended in...

Experimental evidence suggests that past moral actions may positively or negatively influence future moral actions. Cornellissen et al. (2013) find that people’s outcome-based or rule-based mind-set predicts moral path dependencies. We argue that the categorization of the mind-set may also be informative when it comes to explaining the effects that...

Chapter 4 by Christoph Luetge and Matthias Uhl focuses on an innovative methodology, that is, on an experimental approach to ethics. The contributions of experimental disciplines are particularly important if business ethics is to be understood as an interdisciplinary field that includes not only a normative-ethical but also a descriptive-explicati...

We investigate experimentally whether the protégés’ reaction to paternalism depends on the consequences of the paternalistic action to their well-being. Thus, our research is concerned with the perception of paternalism by those who are directly affected by it, rather than with the justifiability of paternalism from an ethical perspective. We find...

Academic philosophy has experienced a major upheaval in the last decade. Venturous young philosophers, psychologists, and economists have begun to challenge the traditional stance that philosophy is an undertaking best pursued from the safety and calm of an arm-chair. Instead, they took the gloves off and brought philosophical questions to the expe...

Absentmindedness is a special case of imperfect recall which according to Piccione and Rubinstein (1997a) leads to time inconsistencies. Aumann, Hart and Perry (1997a) question their argument and show how dynamic inconsistencies can be resolved. The present paper explores this issue from a descriptive point of view by examining the behavior of abse...

The chapters assembled in this volume, we think, show that Experimental Ethics is well on its way. We have seen that Experimental Ethics has quite a clear mission, that is, the empirical research of human moral reasoning in its relationship to classical philosophical ethics, and a historical foundation to build on (Part I of this volume). It is con...

Academic philosophy has experienced a major upheaval in the last decade. Venturous young philosophers, psychologists, and economists have begun to challenge the traditional stance that philosophy is an undertaking best pursued from the safety and calm of an arm-chair. Instead, they took the gloves off and tried to bring philosophical ques-tions to...

This article explains the emergence of an unique equilibrium resolution as the result of a compromise between two selves with different preferences. The stronger this difference is, the more generous the resolution gets. This result is in contrast to predictions of other models in which sinful consumption is distributed bimodally. Therefore, our re...

This experiment investigates whether protEgEs judge paternalism by means of its consequences or on principled grounds. Subjects receive a payment for showing up early the next morning. The later they show up the less they get. ProtEgEs can self-commit to a speci?c show-up time or maintain spontaneity. By making this binary choice, protEgEs express...

Loewenstein (1996, 2005) identifies an intrapersonal empathy gap. In the respective experiments, subjects make choices with delayed consequences. When entering the state where these consequences would unfold, they get the possibility to revise their initial choice. Revisions are more substantial when these two choices are made in different emotiona...

Weak paternalism commits prot�g�s to their own plans. This experiment addresses the question of whether prot�g�s judge weakly paternalistic acts primarily by means of their consequences or on principle grounds. Subjects receive a reward for showing up to the laboratory early the next morning which decreases in time. Prot�g�s can either self-commit...

The notion of choice inconsistency is widely spread in the literature on behavioral economics. Several approaches were used to account for the observation that people reverse their choices over time. This paper aims to explain the formation of resolutions regarded as internal self-binding devices. It moves away from anthropocentric neoclassicism an...

Im Zusammenhang von Medienumbrüchen, sofern diese mit der Neu-Konfiguration ganzer Medien-Ensembles verbunden sind, unterliegen offenbar die beteiligten einzelnen Medien selber der Kategorie des Ephemeren, des Vorübergehenden und Flüchtigen. Auch wenn das Medium als solches gegenüber dieser Art von transitorischen Zeitstrukturen mehr oder weniger i...