Past evidence generally suggests that the presence of female directors on corporate boards tends to improve earnings quality due to these directors’ superior monitoring abilities. However, it is not clear which characteristics and skills of female directors drive such abilities. In this paper, we focus on the financial background of female directors, an area which remains largely unexplored in existing literature. The results show that the participation of female directors with relevant financial background improves earnings quality more than the participation of female directors without such background. In addition, our findings suggest that only female directors possessing relevant financial background and having fewer outside directorships are able to mitigate earnings management and therefore overcommitting expert female directors with more outside directorships would diminish their monitoring ability. We did not find any evidence suggesting that female directors without relevant financial background are able to mitigate earnings management, irrespective of their outside directorships or tenure. We interpret our findings within a theoretical framework that draws on a number of economic and social theories. The results are generally robust after controlling for potential endogeneity problems.

过去的证据普遍表明，由于这些董事具有卓越的监督能力，公司董事会中女性董事的存在往往会提高盈利质量。然而，目前尚不清楚女性导演的哪些特征和技能驱动了这种能力。在本文中，我们重点关注女性董事的财务背景，这一领域在现有文献中仍未得到充分探索。结果表明，具有相关财务背景的女性董事的参与比没有相关财务背景的女性董事参与更能提高收益质量。此外，我们的研究结果表明，只有拥有相关财务背景且外部董事职位较少的女性董事才能减轻盈余管理，因此，过度委派具有更多外部董事职位的专业女性董事会削弱其监督能力。我们没有发现任何证据表明没有相关财务背景的女性董事能够减轻盈余管理，无论其外部董事职位或任期如何。我们在借鉴许多经济和社会理论的理论框架内解释我们的发现。在控制了潜在的内生性问题后，结果通常是稳健的。我们没有发现任何证据表明没有相关财务背景的女性董事能够减轻盈余管理，无论其外部董事职位或任期如何。我们在借鉴许多经济和社会理论的理论框架内解释我们的发现。在控制了潜在的内生性问题后，结果通常是稳健的。我们没有发现任何证据表明没有相关财务背景的女性董事能够减轻盈余管理，无论其外部董事职位或任期如何。我们在借鉴许多经济和社会理论的理论框架内解释我们的发现。在控制了潜在的内生性问题后，结果通常是稳健的。