Slipping on stereotypes – Interactive gender effects in the erosion of ethical behavior

We investigate how gender affects ethical outcomes in repeated same- or mixed-gender interactions. In our first study (N = 681), we use an experimental slippery-slope audit setting (Gino and Bazerman, 2009), in which an “auditor” makes an approval decision about the emerging unethical behavior of an “estimator” whose gender has been made salient. Based on previous evidence, unethical behavior is more likely to be accepted when it emerges gradually compared to a situation where it occurs abruptly. While we do not find a general slippery-slope effect across the whole sample, a significant slippery-slope effect is detected when the estimator is male (d = 0.36) or when the auditor is female (d = 0.27). We observe no slippery-slope effects in same-gender estimator-auditor constellations. However, in mixed-gender constellations, we find opposite effects: when male estimators are audited by females, we observe a significant slippery-slope effect (d = 0.53), driven by a high approval rate in the slippery-slope treatment. Conversely, when female estimators are audited by males, the approval rate increases in the abrupt treatment (d = 0.33). To better understand the drivers of these findings, we asked a different sample of participants (N = 90) to indicate the level of competence or honesty they attribute to male and female estimators in the estimation task. Responses suggest that the detected slippery-slope effects may be driven by auditors (especially females), attributing more competence to male estimators (d = 0.62), which is particularly relevant in the slippery-slope treatment where unethical behavior is difficult to detect. Moreover, our finding that male auditors are particularly inclined to approve overvaluations by females in the abrupt treatment, where unethical behavior becomes salient, may be driven by a more ethical assessment of female estimators (d = 0.90).