Universität zu Köln

Roeben, Fabian ORCID: 0009-0009-2412-2452 (2026). Essays on Digital Economics and AI. PhD thesis, Universität zu Köln.

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Abstract

This dissertation revolves around how digital technologies and artificial intelligence affect the production, presentation, and interpretation of information. Its three chapters study preferences over how news is presented, responses to political framing, and the structure of household macroeconomic expectations. Chapter 1 uses a custom-built AI news app that lets users adjust article presentation while keeping the underlying news event fixed. Users show substantial demand for customization, often preferring less opinionated, more fact-based reporting. Customization improves satisfaction with news, while effects on factual knowledge and polarization are limited. Chapter 2 uses the same app to randomly expose respondents to liberal, conservative, or neutral versions of identical news stories. Respondents consume less and judge articles as less credible when the political framing conflicts with their views. Aligned framing does not increase consumption or satisfaction. Effects on learning and polarization are generally limited, although aligned framing modestly increases issue polarization. Chapter 3 uses panel data from the New York Fed Survey of Consumer Expectations to measure how macroeconomic beliefs move together within households over time. A signed-comovement index captures links among unemployment, saving-rate, and stock-price expectations, while inflation expectations are less connected. Households differ substantially in this structure. Among those with more tightly connected probability expectations, the relationship between inflation expectations and expected spending is flatter. Together, the chapters show how AI and digital media shape information supply and how people select, evaluate, and organize information.

Item Type:	Thesis (PhD thesis)
Creators:	Creators Email ORCID ORCID Put Code Roeben, Fabian fabian.roeben@web.de https://orcid.org/0009-0009-2412-2452 UNSPECIFIED
URN:	urn:nbn:de:hbz:38-813109
Date:	2026
Language:	English
Faculty:	Faculty of Management, Economy and Social Sciences
Divisions:	Exzellenzcluster ECONtribute Faculty of Management, Economics and Social Sciences > Economics > Microeconomics, Institutions and markets > Professur für Economics and Management
Subjects:	Economics
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Keywords Language Digital Economics English Artificial Intelligence English Behavioral Economics English
Date of oral exam:	27 August 2026
Referee:	Name Academic Title Roth, Christopher Prof. Dr. Zimmermann, Tom Prof. Dr.
Refereed:	Yes
URI:	http://kups.ub.uni-koeln.de/id/eprint/81310