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Using Unconscious Thought To Improve Evaluations Of Complex Accounting Estimates, Blake Holman

Theses and Dissertations--Accountancy

Accounting practitioners and regulators have recently focused efforts toward increasing the efficiency of management review controls (MRCs), including the evaluation of complex accounting estimates. Although increasing cognitive effort (i.e., conscious deliberation) is an intuitively appealing strategy for improving decision quality, Unconscious Thought Theory (UTT) suggests that a period of unconscious thought is a more beneficial strategy in complex domains. Drawing on UTT, I predict and find across two studies that prompting accounting practitioners to engage in unconscious thought facilitates the recognition of patterns of bias within management provided estimates, resulting in higher quality assessments of fair value estimates. My findings …

Does Audit Regulation Improve The Underlying Information Used By Managers? Evidence From Pcaob Inspection Access And Management Forecast Accuracy, Brant E. Christensen, Lijun (Gillian) Lei, Sydney Qing Shu, Wayne Thomas

Faculty Publications

Survey evidence and academic research raise the possibility that audit regulation can impact not only the information contained in external financial reports but also the internal information used by management. We investigate this possibility by examining the improvement in management forecast accuracy around initiation of the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board's (PCAOB) international inspection program. Consistent with managers having improved information, we find that managers issue more accurate forecasts following PCAOB inspection access. Multiple additional analyses support that an improved information environment is the mechanism underlying our results, and this effect is distinct from, and incremental to, any effects of …

The Icfr Process: Perspectives Of Accounting Executives At Large Public Companies, Eldar Maksymov, Jeffrey Pickerd, T. Jeffrey Wilks, Devin Williams

Faculty Publications

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act charges management with the primary responsibility for internal control over financial reporting (ICFR). However, prior research tells us little about the ICFR process from management’s perspective. We develop a theoretical model of the ICFR process from management’s perspective and examine that model by surveying 145 and interviewing 35 accounting executives at large US public companies. Our primary finding is that executives feel constrained in their ability to direct ICFR and hold perspectives that reflect these constraints. Specifically, most executives feel compelled by auditors to follow the PCAOB’s preferences even though executives believe these preferences often tend to …

Measurement Error, Fixed Effects, And False Positives In Accounting Research, Jared Jennings, Jung Min Kim, Joshua A. Lee, Daniel Taylor

Faculty Publications

We show theoretically and empirically that measurement error can bias in favor of falsely rejecting a true null hypothesis (i.e., a “false positive”) and that regression models with high-dimensional fixed effects can exacerbate measurement error bias and increase the likelihood of false positives. We replicate inferences from prior work in a setting where we can directly observe the amount of measurement error and show that the combination of measurement error and fixed effects materially inflates coefficients and distorts inferences. We provide researchers with a simple diagnostic tool to assess the possibility that the combination of measurement error and fixed effects …

Ethnic Minority Analysts’ Participation In Public Earnings Conference Calls, Rachel W. Flam, Jeremiah Green, Joshua A. Lee, Nathan Y. Sharp

Faculty Publications

We investigate ethnic minority and non-minority sell-side analysts’ participation in public earnings conference calls. We find that minority analysts are underrepresented in conference call Q&A sessions, and minority analysts who do participate on the calls experience lower levels of prioritization than do nonminority analysts. Minority analysts’ lower participation rates are partially but not fully mediated by characteristics such as experience, work environment, and stock rating favorability. Additionally, firm and conference call fixed effects mediate approximately half the magnitude of lower minority participation rates. Extroverted minority analysts participate at higher rates, but the negative association between minority status and conference call …

Innovations In Ipo Deal Structure: Do Up-C Ipos Harm Public Shareholders?, Mary Brooke Billings, Kevin Hsueh, Melissa F. Lewis-Western, Gladriel Shobe

Faculty Publications

This paper examines an innovation in capital formation that has spurred contentious debate: the Umbrella Partnership Corporation (“Up-C”) IPO. Advisors and underwriters argue that the Up-C deal structure is a driver of post-IPO value and, thus, is a value-enhancing means of raising capital that may be one solution to concerns regarding the drop in the number of publicly traded companies. Consistent with these claims, recent research suggests that organizing soon-to-be public businesses as pass-through entities (as is the case for Up-Cs) leads to superior future performance. Yet, broadening the analysis to consider abnormal stock performance and post-IPO litigation of a …

The Spillover Effect Of Sec Comment Letters Through Audit Firms, Kenneth L. Bills, Ryan Cating, Chenxi Lin, Timothy Seidel

Faculty Publications

This study examines whether auditors serve as a conduit for disseminating Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) views on reporting and disclosure matters as the result of being privy to clients’ SEC comment letters. This examination is important because auditors’ involvement in, and private access to, clients’ comment letters can enhance the timeliness of dissemination and have a constraining influence on reporting or disclosure choices that diverge from SEC views. Among clients with a greater expectation of impaired goodwill that do not receive a comment letter with a goodwill-related comment, we find a greater likelihood of goodwill impairment when the audit …

Balancing Loyalties: A Behavioral Study On How The Quality Of Supervisor-Subordinate Relationships Affects Whistleblowing Intentions, Jace B. Garrett, Douglas F. Prawitt, Kyle Sopp

Faculty Publications

While high-quality relationships among employees yield many benefits to organizations, they may have unintended consequences for whistleblowing. In a first experiment, we investigate whether high-quality employee-supervisor relationships reduce employees’ willingness to report supervisor wrongdoing through an internal hotline. We also investigate whether the quality of such relationships mitigates the effect of evidence strength on reporting intention. In a second experiment, we test the robustness of the effects of relationship quality and evidence strength on employees’ willingness to report wrongdoing identified in our first experiment, but to an external auditor. We also examine two factors that may mitigate the negative effect …

The Impact Of Compensation Framing On Work Relationships, Jack Wixson

Honors Theses and Capstones

This paper attempts to understand the effects of compensation framing on performance, work relationships, and organizational citizenship behavior. 108 study participants worked under either a bonus or penalty framed contract to complete an effort-based task. The results of the study indicate that employees will exert more effort to get to know their supervisor and demonstrate more good behavior under a bonus frame versus a penalty frame. These findings are important for companies to recognize how different compensation structures impact their employees. Companies can be more successful if they put in more time and effort to better understand their employees.

Audit Report Timeliness In Local Governments: An Observation Of North Carolina Governmental Units’ Response To State-Imposed Deadlines And Consequences, Amber N. Daniels

Doctor of Business Administration Dissertations

To provide citizens with transparent financial information regarding the health of their respective districts, local government unit leaders must furnish governmental audit reports in a timely manner. Further, for management to effectively implement auditor suggestions for improvements, leaders must have accessibility to timely audited information. Many governmental units in the state of North Carolina have demonstrated significant lags in reporting timeliness and often miss state-mandated deadlines. Therefore, this research utilized ordinary least-squares regression to estimate the effects the variables representing report message and managerial competency, accountability, and audit environment groups had on the time required for each unit to file …

Nonprofit Leader Strategies For Revenue Growth And Financial Sustainability, William David Woods

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Nonprofit leaders must ceaselessly endeavor to become more entrepreneurial by accumulating strategies for growing organizational revenue and promoting financial sustainability when charitable contributions cannot fund their business operations. The failure to obtain charitable contributions can lead to nonprofit closure. Grounded in behavioral portfolio theory, the purpose of this qualitative single case study was to explore strategies a leader of a small Wisconsin nonprofit used to increase revenue and financial sustainability when charitable contributions were insufficient to finance business operations. Data collection included semistructured interviews; organizational documents and reports; financial records and reports; social media; and internet reports. Data were analyzed …

External Analysis Of Avis Car Rental: Impact Of External Factors On Business Operations, John R. Milton

Undergraduate Theses, Professional Papers, and Capstone Artifacts

No abstract provided.

Source Credibility In The Community Service Of Financial Literacy For Indonesian Vocational School Students, Neneng Salmiah, Afred Suci, Rita Wiyati

ASEAN Journal of Community Engagement

This paper examines the credibility of source persons for community service projects in improving financial literacy for vocational school students in Indonesia. Improving financial literacy among Indonesian youth is a long-term effort that requires multi- collaboration between the government, financial institutions, educational institutions, NGOs, and other stakeholders. Despite its substandard position to Singapore, Myanmar, and Malaysia, Indonesia’s financial literacy proficiency has improved significantly—one of which—after being catalyzed by the government’s cooperation with higher education institutions through community service programs. However, amid these improvements, greater attention must be given to capital markets, whose literacy level is most deficient compared to the …

Employees’ Reactions To Their Supervisors’ (Lack Of) Discretionary Adjustments In Performance Evaluations, Joanna Andrejkow

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

The purpose of my dissertation is to investigate how employees react to their supervisors’ decisions not to use ex-post discretionary adjustments to mitigate the effects that negative unexpected events have on their bonuses. To address this objective, I pose the following research question: Will the level of interdependence inherent within the compensation of multiple employees (i.e., compensation interdependence) and the likelihood the event will reoccur (i.e., future event likelihood) affect employees’ reactions (future effort and workplace deviance) when they don’t receive ex-post discretionary adjustments to mitigate the effects of negative events?

I address my research question using an experiment where …

Incumbent Competition And Private Agenda, Anne Marie Go

DLSU Business & Economics Review

Consider two politicians who decide whether to follow what they believe the electorate wants or choose the option that secures their private gain. Policies are implemented when the politicians reach a unanimous decision. The electorate only rewards a politician when a policy is implemented or when the politician is the only one whose action coincides with the popular decision. The results show that if politicians have good decision-making abilities, sufficiently high payoffs in policy implementation—given moderate private agenda payoffs—push them to implement the popular policy. For very poor decision- making abilities, at sufficiently high policy rewards, politicians vote for the …

Inequality, Oligarchy, And Dynasty, Ronald U. Mendoza

DLSU Business & Economics Review

Although some scholars frame inequality as a necessary step towards economic growth, this paper highlights its double- edged nature by examining oligarchy and dynasty as elements of inequality in the Philippine context. The best way to

ascertain whether inequality can be advantageous for development is to examine how it shapes the context that it works in. The presence of political dynasties is then evaluated based on their impact on patterns of leadership in the country, whereas business oligarchs are assessed by their influence over the structure of the economy. The paper concludes with a three-point agenda to address the root …

Small Business Internal Control System Strategies To Protect Business Assets And Profitability, Edward Gabriel Earl Kuupualeialoha Keaunui

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The absence of financial expertise and internal control systems contributes to losing business assets and profitability. Small business leaders who lack internal control systems and strategies to protect against the financial loss of business assets and profitability may be vulnerable and suffer losses. Grounded in the Committee of the Sponsoring Organization of the Treadway Commission (COSO) internal control-integrated framework, this qualitative multiple-case study explores internal control system strategies that small business leaders use to protect business assets and profitability. The participants were five small business leaders from the Western region of the United States who have successfully operated for over …

Nonprofit Leader Strategies For Revenue Growth And Financial Sustainability, William David Woods

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Nonprofit leaders must ceaselessly endeavor to become more entrepreneurial by accumulating strategies for growing organizational revenue and promoting financial sustainability when charitable contributions cannot fund their business operations. The failure to obtain charitable contributions can lead to nonprofit closure. Grounded in behavioral portfolio theory, the purpose of this qualitative single case study was to explore strategies a leader of a small Wisconsin nonprofit used to increase revenue and financial sustainability when charitable contributions were insufficient to finance business operations. Data collection included semistructured interviews; organizational documents and reports; financial records and reports; social media; and internet reports. Data were analyzed …

A Study Of Auditors' Judgement When Taking Management's Perspective On Management Discussion And Analysis, Wattanachai Sangsuwan

Chulalongkorn University Theses and Dissertations (Chula ETD)

This experimental research examines the effect of management’s perspective on auditors’ judgment when they review management discussion and analysis (MD&A). This study predicts that prompting management’s perspective would benefit auditors by enabling them to more accurately review MD&A whether or not the MD&A is materially misstated. Contrary to our expectations, prompting auditors with a management’s perspective will backfire. The results find that auditors prompted by management's perspective are significantly more likely to accept MD&A that has an abnormally positive tone. In other words, auditors are less likely to ask management to alter MD&A that has such abnormally positive language. Management’s …

Managers’ Use Of Humor On Public Earnings Conference Calls, Andrew C. Call, Rachel W> Flam, Joshua A. Lee, Nathan Y. Sharp

Faculty Publications

Despite the prevalence and importance of humor in interpersonal communication, the disclosure literature is silent on the use of humor in the context of corporate communication. Using a sophisticated machine learning algorithm, we identify managers’ successful uses of humor during public earnings conference calls. When managers use humor on an earnings call, stock market returns and analyst forecast revisions following the call are more positive, primarily because of a muted response to negative earnings news. Consistent with managers’ successful use of humor being a favorable signal of future firm performance, we find no evidence of a return reversal over the …

Postmaterialism And Corporate Tax Avoidance, Yujia Cui, Jiwei Wang, Kangtao Ye

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

Using a proprietary dataset of China tax audits, we found that firms owned by investors from countries with higher postmaterialism values were less likely to engage in tax-avoidance behavior in China. In addition, we found some evidence that the negative association between postmaterialism and tax avoidance is more pronounced when tax enforcement is stronger, indicating that national culture and formal institutions act as complements. To check the external validity of our main results, we further used a cross-country sample from 21 countries over 22 years. The evidence from the cross-country sample was consistent with the findings obtained from the China …

Eagle Accountant - 2023, Georgia Southern University

Eagle Accountant

• Accounting Advisory Council
• Advisory Council Spotlight
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• Commencement 2023
• Cover Story: Ironman
• Student Spotlight: Soaring to New Heights
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• Accounting Day 2023
• Student Organizations & Activities
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• Faculty Research, Publications, & Service
• Alumni Spotlight: An Eagle on Pennsylvania Avenue
• Alumni Notes, Awards, & Recognition
• In Memoriam

Esg Scores As A Measure Of Risk: The Relationship Between Environmental, Social, And Corporate Governance Ratings And The Financial Performance Of U.S. Oil And Gas Companies, Lauren Kim

Scripps Senior Theses

This study investigates the association between ESG (environmental, social, corporate governance) scores on the financial performance of U.S. oil and gas companies, an industry facing significant ESG-related pressures. ESG scores evaluate a firm’s environmental impacts, social responsibility, and corporate governance practices and can be used as a form of evaluating a firm’s risk mitigation efforts. However, there is not sufficient evidence to conclude that there exists a relationship, positive or negative, between ESG scores and firm performance in this industry. Overall, the findings of this study highlight the growing interest in ESG investing and is useful for investors and firms …

The Knottiest Of Gordian Knots: Article 17 Of The Copyright Directive, Mark Hyland, Thomas Perry

Articles

This article analyses the much debated Article 17 of the EU Copyright Directive (Directive 2019/790) in the light of last year’s comprehensive European Commission guidance. The aim of the guidance is to support a correct and coherent transposition of Article 17 across the EU27. Following the recent landmark judgment in Case C-401/19, Poland v European Parliament and Council of the EU, some commentators have now suggested that it might be timely for the European Commission to issue further guidance on Article 17.

The Power Of Education In A Globalised World: Challenging Geoeconomic Inequalities, Ozéias Rocha, Daniel Kamphambale, Cormac Macmahon, Jon Hans Coetzer, Lucía Morales

Articles

The globalization process has led to significant levels of controversy, as over the past few years, researchers have highlighted its negative connotations in terms of exacerbating economic inequalities, environmental degradation, exploitation of workers, loss of cultural diversity, and negative influence on democratic systems and financial stability. The negative connotation associated with the globalization process is not surprising. The implications for the global educational system significantly dominated by the influence of Western values, culture, and economic models based on consumerism to the detriment of traditional cultural and local identities have been eroded. The world economies are facing emerging areas of significant …

Breaking The Glass Ceiling: Do Female Auditors In Public Accounting Shine?, Katie Dubois

Honors Theses and Capstones

This honors thesis examines the significance that female auditors have in shaping the public accounting profession. The study investigates the impact of female auditors on various aspects of the profession, including quality, profitability, and risk. By conducting a comprehensive literature review and analyzing gathered data, this research explores the factors that contribute to the influence of female auditors and the implications for the profession.

The findings highlight that female auditors do in fact impact the public accounting profession positively. Moreover, the data revealed that gender-diverse audit teams enhance audit quality and firm profitability. Client relationships are also positively influenced, as …

Does Gender And Ethnic Diversity Among Audit Partners Influence Office-Level Audit Personnel Retention And Audit Quality?, Eric R. Condie, Ling Lei Lisic, Timothy Seidel, J. Mike Truelson, Aleksandra "Ally" B. Zimmerman

Faculty Publications

Motivated by prior literature on organizational identification and 23 semistructured interviews with a variety of U.S. audit partners and directors, we examine whether the gender and ethnic diversity of an office’s audit partners influences the retention of the office’s audit professionals and the quality of the audits conducted by the office. Using hand-collected data on U.S. audit partners, we find that greater levels of (or changes in) diversity in office audit partners’ gender and ethnicity are associated with lower (reduced) turnover among office audit professionals and higher (increased) office-level audit quality. To provide further insight into the audit quality results, …

Reduced Audit Quality Acts: A Review And Organizational Model, Troy A. Hyatt, Douglas F. Prawitt, Kyle M. Stubbs

Faculty Publications

With increasing regulatory focus on improving audit quality, research on drivers of audit quality remains important to academics, professionals and regulators. One compelling branch of this research focuses on auditors' intentional actions that reduce audit quality, often referred to in the literature as reduced audit quality acts (RAQAs). This paper provides a review and synthesis of the RAQA literature, including a unifying definition for RAQAs and a model for organizing past and future RAQA research. With the model, we explore antecedents to RAQAs as well as the discovery of, responses to and subsequent consequences of RAQAs. We also discuss potential …

Current Issues Faced By Controllers, Anthony C. Bucaro, T. Jeffrey Wilks, Christopher Yust

Faculty Publications

We conduct a series of semi-structured interviews with controllers and chief accounting officers from large public and private companies—over half are Fortune 500—to identify the current issues faced by the controllership function. We map these issues into the Institute of Management Accountants (IMA®) Management Accounting Competencies and highlight recent research that addresses these issues and where there are gaps. Our findings suggest three IMA competencies that weigh heavily on controllers’ minds: (1) collaboration, teamwork, and relationship management; (2) information systems and technology; and (3) talent management. Finally, we describe how the insights from controllers suggest important improvements to accounting curriculum …

Exploring The Benefit Of Introducing Accounting And Finance Knowledge For Micro And Small Entrepreneurs During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Nurul Hidayah, Lucky Nugroho, Harry Suharman, Anees Janee Ali

ASEAN Journal of Community Engagement

This study aims to explore the benefit of introducing the accounting and finance knowledge for micro and small business enterprises, in particular during the time of the coronavirus disease 2019. The COVID-19 pandemic has severely affected the micro and small enterprises. A large number of industries faced the risk of lower sales, which in turn badly hit their businesses. To assist micro and small business entrepreneurs in maintaining sustainability by improving their bookkeeping skills by using digital applications, a team of lecturers from Universitas Mercu Buana, Indonesia, and Universiti Sains Malaysia, Malaysia, collaborated on socialization activities and interactions. The lecturers …