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Exploratory Study Of Early Empiricism In U.S. Accounting Literature, Dale A. Buckmaster, Kok-Foo Theang

Accounting Historians Journal

Little or nothing is said of empiricism in U.S. accounting literature during the first half of the twentieth century in accounting history literature. The objectives of this study are threefold: (1) to determine if an empirical accounting literature existed prior to 1950; (2) to determine if pre-1950 empiricism was extensive enough and substantive enough to have influenced the development of accounting thought; and (3) to compare pre-1950 empirical work with contemporary academic research. It is concluded that empirics were common prior to 1950 from examining a sample (approximately forty percent) of volumes (clusters) of The Accounting Review, The Journal of …