We investigate how the design of audit processes influences employees’ reporting decisions. We focus specifically on detective employee audits for which several employees are randomly selected after a defined period to audit their ex-post behavior. We investigate two design features of the audit process, namely, employee anonymity and process transparency, and analyze their impact on misreporting.

Organizations often promote procedural justice by increasing the transparency of managerial decisions and encouraging employees’ voice in the decision process. We experimentally investigate how implementing these control policies in hierarchical organizations (owners vs. managers vs. employees) affects managers’ resource-allocation decision and employee effort. We predict and find that managers allocate

ABSTRACT Although an increasing number of companies have publicly declared environmental targets (ETs), scant research has been conducted in this area. This study, therefore, investigates the extent of corporate environmental targets disclosure (ETD) and empirically examines whether environmental governance and performance influence the ETD of companies in the U.K. during the 2005–2013 period. We find

ABSTRACT We examine analytically the strategic path auditors take towards becoming industry specialists in terms of their investments in the acquisition of industry specific knowledge and their pricing behavior. We identify characteristics of the competitive environment that provide incentives to improve audit quality as accounting firms strive to achieve industry specialization. These characteristics

Intuition suggests that shareholders benefit from active boards. We present a model to show that if contract renegotiation is possible, then an active board might not always be desirable from the shareholders' perspective. This happens because low board activity may partially offset the distortion in the manager's incentives caused by the renegotiation option. While the value of low board activity

(2021). Thank you to Associate Editors, Editorial Board Members, Ad hoc Associate Editors, Guest Editors, and Reviewers 2020. European Accounting Review: Vol. 30, No. 1, pp. 222-235.

ABSTRACT This study explores the rhetorical strategies underlying the discursive construction of the German controller social-identity in the mid-1970s. Previous research has shown how management accounting professionals struggle with different role models for the management accountant. This study complements this work by using the case of the German controller to investigate how broader ideas about

This paper examines professional associations’ local responses to global demands of accounting standardisation. Our longitudinal study from 1998 to 2018 analyses how professional associations of the German audit profession engaged in an intense framing contest over the adoption of external quality controls. Drawing on the concept of strategic action field and the literature on framing, we unpack how

This paper examines how a firm’s employment policy, particularly employee cash profit-sharing plans, affects its financial reporting. We find that firms with employee cash profit-sharing programs are more likely to engage in downward earnings management to reduce labor costs, especially with decreasing performance. This effect is more evident in firms with higher labor costs and human-capital reliant

ABSTRACT This study focuses on the recent development in audit technologies, i.e., the rise of Big Data and Analytics (BDA) tools, and how auditors make use of them in audits. While prior audit studies have acknowledged that audit technologies shape and re-construct the market for audit services, they have not devoted much attention to the performative nature of such technologies and how their properties

This study provides the first comprehensive literature review on interim reporting based on 112 papers published between 1961 and 2020. The review focuses on both the firm-specific consequences (capital market-based and real effects) and externalities of interim reporting. We analyze three primary interim reporting characteristics: (1) frequency, (2) contents, and (3) assurance. The review allows us

ABSTRACT This paper offers insights into the accounting profession’s recent trend of establishing young-professionals boards. Our study uses rich fieldwork data to provide an in-depth analysis of how a committee of young accountants (the Young Profs), embedded in the Dutch professional institute, attempts to achieve relevance in professional debates. Taking two distinct perspectives, we first study

This study provides the first comprehensive literature review on interim reporting based on 112 papers published between 1961 and 2020. The review focuses on both the firm-specific consequences (capital market-based and real effects) and externalities of interim reporting. We analyze three primary interim reporting characteristics: (1) frequency, (2) contents, and (3) assurance. The review allows us

ABSTRACT This paper offers insights into the accounting profession’s recent trend of establishing young-professionals boards. Our study uses rich fieldwork data to provide an in-depth analysis of how a committee of young accountants (the Young Profs), embedded in the Dutch professional institute, attempts to achieve relevance in professional debates. Taking two distinct perspectives, we first study

We examine the implications of auditor education for audit quality and audit pricing. We exploit a novel institutional setting in the UK, where auditors major in many different degrees at university and signing auditors are identifiable. Using hand-collected data for a large sample of signing auditors, we establish two main findings. First, auditors whose degrees have a quantitative orientation are

Insights and technologies from neuroscience research can help accounting scholars more deeply understand how decision-makers physically and cognitively process and react to accounting information and controls. We conduct a systematic review of accounting literature to evaluate whether and how accounting scholars are incorporating neuroscience research into their work and building a field of ‘neuroaccounting

ABSTRACT We provide a comprehensive review and synthesis of behavioral experimental literature that examines persuasion in auditing. We organize our review by applying the five Components of Persuasive Communication from the Communication-Persuasion Matrix. Our synthesis identifies two primary contexts in which persuasion attempts occur in the auditing setting: (1) auditors and clients engaging in

ABSTRACT This paper investigates whether the level of customer concentration can moderate the effect of the Sarbanes–Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX) on the earnings management of U.S. corporations. Large customers can act as a mechanism for reducing agency problems by pressuring supplier firms to be more efficient. Large customers may act as certifying agents for a supplier, and they may reduce information

ABSTRACT Despite the economic significance of private equity (PE) firms, there has been limited investigation into the control mechanisms they implement to manage relationships with their portfolio companies. Through a comparative field study, we describe the role and characteristics of controls implemented by PE firms and the contextual factors associated with the relative importance of different

ABSTRACT Extant literature suggests that audit firms establish political connections at the national level to lobby regulators and legislators. In this paper we construct a novel dataset of Big 4 auditors’ political connections at the audit office level and examine the implications of auditors’ political connections for their audit quality. We find that client firms of politically connected audit offices

ABSTRACT Previous accounting research shows that taxes affect decision making by individuals and firms. Most studies assume that agents have an accurate perception regarding their tax burden. However, there is a growing body of literature analyzing whether taxes are indeed perceived correctly. We review 128 studies on the measurement of tax misperception and its behavioral implications. The review

ABSTRACT As signals of internal control weaknesses, cyber security incidents can represent significant risk factors to the quality of financial reporting. We empirically assess the audit quality implications of data breaches for a large sample of US firms. Using a difference-in-difference approach based on a matched sample of breached and non-breached firms, we find no evidence that cyber-security

ABSTRACT This paper is the first to investigate the impact of banks’ organizational memory of past history on the conservatism of accounting policy. Specifically, we investigate two types of bad time history: banks’ undercapitalization and the failures of other banks during financial crises. Using a large sample of U.S. banks over the period 1997–2013, we find that both types of bad times are positively

ABSTRACT This paper synthesizes research on audit firm culture (AFC) over the past decade, reviewing recent developments in research on factors instilling culture in audit firms, and how culture influences audit quality and auditors’ work attitudes. We develop and apply a three-phase model based on prior research and professional guidance (IAASB, 2014), which maps cultural embedding mechanisms (EMs

Abstract Using the annual Russell 1000/2000 index reconstitution as an exogenous shock to institutional ownership (IO), I examine the effect of IO on firms’ decisions regarding the time of day to announce earnings. I argue that firms with high IO strategically choose to announce earnings after hours to facilitate post-announcement price discovery and reduce volatility because the after-hours period

ABSTRACT Client inquiry is a foundational financial statement audit procedure. However, the literature offers little evidence regarding how auditors perform client inquiry and how note taking during client inquiry is associated with audit quality. We conduct a mixed-methods study to examine these issues. First, we conduct interviews with seven highly-experienced auditors and five staff auditors to

Extant literature on target-setting indicates that responding to achievability-related criticisms towards ex ante targets through repair actions are of significance in restoring fairness and maintaining the legitimacy of performance systems. By drawing on empirical materials on responses to unfairness criticisms raised against target-setting practices in a bank, the study shows that such legitimation

This paper investigates whether foreign ownership affects audit fees by analyzing shareholdings of listed firms from Western European countries. The results show that foreign ownership is an important factor that drives the demand for audit services. However, the willingness to pay higher audit fees is mainly driven by the quality of governance and investor protection of the foreign investor's home

ABSTRACT In this study, we examine the trade-offs between earnings management (both accruals and real) and covenant violations by examining how they are associated with future accounting and stock market performance. We analyze a matched-pair sample of covenant violation firms with non-violation firms that have a similar risk of a covenant violation. We have three main findings. First, our evidence

ABSTRACT As prior evidence on deferred taxes under IFRS is scarce and inconclusive, this study examines whether deferred taxes reported in a German conservative accounting environment have information content. To improve informativeness, I propose a new split into four deferred tax categories. Applying this split, I replicate prior literature’s value relevance tests. Next, I examine whether the (lack

ABSTRACT This study investigates the impact on audit pricing of PCAOB inspection outcomes on the quality control systems of small audit firms. Quality control deficiencies (QCDs) provide a strong signal about audit quality, which is expected to lead to price changing. We first document that audit fees in the pre-inspection period were higher for small audit firms without QCDs, implying that quality

ABSTRACT Time estimates are an important part of many costing systems. As they may be subject to estimation error and hence result in measurement error in product and service costs, it is important to understand the sources of this estimation error as well as mechanisms to mitigate them. We performed a computer-based lab experiment to test the joint impact of task interruption and interactive time