Download or read book The Effect of Audit Culture on Auditor Honesty and Skepticism written by Ryan Sommerfeldt and published by . This book was released on 2019 with total page 44 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Auditors' honesty and skepticism are crucial to their effectiveness as enablers of trust in capital markets. Regulators have recently expressed concerns that audit culture does not sufficiently strengthen these attributes. We overcome significant obstacles to investigate the influence of audit culture on auditor honesty and skepticism. In our experiment, practicing auditors and non-auditor accountants take part in two economic tasks with economic incentives that allow us to unobtrusively measure honesty and skepticism. Drawing on prior research, we measure the influence of audit culture by manipulating the salience of participants' occupational identity. We find evidence that audit culture increases skepticism but decreases honesty. We do not observe a similar effect for non-auditor accountants, suggesting our auditor findings are not driven by broader firm- or profession-wide influences.

Download or read book The Effects of Auditor Rotation Professional Skepticism and Interactions with Managers on Audit Quality written by Kendall Bowlin and published by . This book was released on 2015 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: We examine whether the effect of mandatory auditor rotation on audit quality depends on the mental frame auditors adopt in evaluating management representations. In practice, auditors can alternately frame their assessments of management representations in terms of their potential dishonesty (what we term skepticism) or potential honesty. Using psychology theory and a laboratory experiment, we predict and find that mandatory rotation improves audit quality when an auditor takes an honesty frame, but that this effect reverses when an auditor takes a skeptical frame. Thus, the benefit of using a skeptical frame occurs when auditors do not rotate, but requiring rotation can reduce audit effort for auditors using a skeptical frame. An implication of our study is that focusing auditors on a skeptical assessment frame rather than mandating auditor rotation may be a less costly way to reduce low-effort audits and aggressive reporting.

Download or read book The Influence of Information Order Effects and Trait Professional Skepticism on Auditors Belief Revisions written by Kristina Yankova and published by Springer. This book was released on 2015-02-10 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Kristina Yankova addresses the question of what role professional skepticism plays in the context of cognitive biases (the so-called information order effects) in auditor judgment. Professional skepticism is a fundamental concept in auditing. Despite its immense importance to audit practice and the voluminous literature on this issue, professional skepticism is a topic which still involves more questions than answers. The work provides important theoretical and empirical insights into the behavioral implications of professional skepticism in auditing.

Download or read book Government Auditing Standards 2018 Revision written by United States Government Accountability Office and published by Lulu.com. This book was released on 2019-03-24 with total page 234 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Audits provide essential accountability and transparency over government programs. Given the current challenges facing governments and their programs, the oversight provided through auditing is more critical than ever. Government auditing provides the objective analysis and information needed to make the decisions necessary to help create a better future. The professional standards presented in this 2018 revision of Government Auditing Standards (known as the Yellow Book) provide a framework for performing high-quality audit work with competence, integrity, objectivity, and independence to provide accountability and to help improve government operations and services. These standards, commonly referred to as generally accepted government auditing standards (GAGAS), provide the foundation for government auditors to lead by example in the areas of independence, transparency, accountability, and quality through the audit process. This revision contains major changes from, and supersedes, the 2011 revision.

Download or read book The Influence of Information Order Effects and Trait Professional Skepticism on Auditors Belief Revisions written by Kristina Yankova and published by . This book was released on 2015 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Kristina Yankova addresses the question of what role professional skepticism plays in the context of cognitive biases (the so-called information order effects) in auditor judgment. Professional skepticism is a fundamental concept in auditing. Despite its immense importance to audit practice and the voluminous literature on this issue, professional skepticism is a topic which still involves more questions than answers. The work provides important theoretical and empirical insights into the behavioral implications of professional skepticism in auditing. Contents Belief Revision and Information Order Effects Professional Skepticism Empirical Analysis Target Groups Researchers and students in the fields of accounting and auditing Practitioners in these areas The Author Dr. Kristina Yankova completed her doctoral studies under the guidance of Prof. Dr. Annette Köhler at the Chair of Accounting and Auditing at the Mercator School of Management, University of Duisburg-Essen.

Download or read book A Study of Professional Skepticism written by Carmen Olsen and published by Springer. This book was released on 2017-01-31 with total page 62 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book describes how auditors exercise different levels of professional skepticism and how they are exposed to different types of affective information on clients’ behavior. Based on the author’s empirical study of 56 auditors, it shows that auditors’ skepticism and affective reactions towards a client interact to influence their appraisal of valuation problems. It also suggests that the effects of auditors’ affective reactions on their skeptical judgments depend on the level of risk in the audit engagement.

Download or read book Ethics and the Internal Auditor s Political Dilemma written by Lynn Fountain and published by CRC Press. This book was released on 2016-12-12 with total page 259 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book helps auditors understand the reality of performing the internal audit role and the importance of properly managing ethical standards. It provides many examples of ethical conflicts and proposes alternative actions for the internal auditor. Internal auditors are well-schooled on the IIA Standards, but the reality is that the pressure placed on internal auditors related to execution of work and upholding ethical standards can be very difficult. Regardless of best practice or theory, auditors must be personally prepared to manage through issues they run across.

Download or read book The Effects of a Supportive Learning Culture and Rank on Professional Skepticism in Information Search written by Therese Grohnert and published by . This book was released on 2020 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Auditors are required to apply professional skepticism throughout the audit process: when searching for information, when forming a judgment, and when deciding on which actions to take. Consequently, audit firms have a vested interest in fostering professional skepticism. Extant conceptual models propose that knowledge is a central driver of professional skepticism, yet a common measure of knowledge - experience - has proven to be an unreliable proxy: it does not take into account that auditors have to learn from experience to develop knowledge. Insights from psychology and management studies emphasize that this learning does not occur automatically, but that it can be fostered at the firm level through a supportive learning culture. Based on these streams of research, the present study explores whether a firm's learning culture interacts with experience to foster professional skepticism. We observed information search behaviors and recorded intentions to act of 166 auditors across ranks using a representative audit task. Our results show that higher-ranking auditors benefit from working in a more supportive learning culture: they engaged in significantly more skeptical information search and in turn formulated more skeptical intentions to act. A supportive learning culture is therefore essential for enabling the ongoing development of knowledge and exercising professional skepticism, especially at the ranks of manager and partner.

Download or read book Summary of the Accounting Establishment written by United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on Government Operations. Subcommittee on Reports, Accounting, and Management and published by . This book was released on 1976 with total page 28 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Handbook on Ethics in Finance written by Leire San-Jose and published by . This book was released on 2019 with total page 600 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Intersection of Auditor Independence Objectivity and Integrity in High risk Audit Conditions written by George Kwadwo Baah and published by . This book was released on 2016 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The rich store of audit quality research and steady improvements to auditing standards over the decades have not yielded the desired impact on audit quality. While most litigations following corporate failure naming auditors as defendants tend to accuse auditors of lack of independence, objectivity and willful participation in fraud, the impact of these character dimensions on audit quality has not been fully explored. Professional accounting bodies impress upon their members to be independent in fact and in appearance, be objective and exhibit integrity in their decisions about their clients' financials statement, yet, not much is known about how independence, objectivity, and integrity impact audit quality. Secondly, not much is known about how auditors enact independence, objectivity, and integrity on an audit engagement. Also, inputs from auditors have been quite underutilized in audit quality research in recent years, yet auditors are the people who implement changes in auditing standards and regulations. This dissertation focuses on the very character dimensions that auditors tend to be accused of lacking to examine the impact of independence, objectivity, integrity, and environmental constraints on audit quality. Guided by institutional theory and the theory of negotiated order, a multi-staged, three-part sequential mixed methods study consisting of one quantitative and two qualitative studies were conducted using responses from audit managers. Survey responses from auditors in the United Kingdom and the United States were used to perform an exploratory theoretical study of the impact of Independence, Objectivity, Integrity, and Constraints on Audit Quality. The second study was conducted to identify a highly constrained business environment where the impact of Independence, Objectivity, and Integrity on Audit Quality could be validated. Following the second study, a third study was conducted to understand the effects of the institutional environment on audit quality and how auditors respond to the effects of the institutional factors. The research finds that auditors' integrity is a consistent determinant of audit quality. The positive significant impact of integrity on audit quality does not change when integrity interacts with environmental constraints. Contrary to the general notions about the importance of independence to audit quality, the research finds that independence and objectivity do not have a significant direct effect on audit quality. However, moderating independence on objectivity leads to a significant effect on audit quality. Independence strengthens the positive effect of objectivity on audit quality. But the positive impact of interacting independence and objectivity on audit quality reduces substantially when the interaction variable interacts with environmental constraints. Auditors tend not rely on their independence when the impact of environmental constraints are weak, and they tend to ignore or bend their interpretation and enactment of independence and objectivity and rather rely on their integrity when the environmental constraints are high. These findings show that agents resort to their inner core beliefs when making decisions under high-risk conditions. This dissertation makes theoretical and practical contributions to the literature. The quantitative research for the dissertation is the first known empirical analyses or validation of impact of external constraints, independence, objectivity, and integrity on audit quality using data from auditors. The research challenges the continued emphasis on independence as the core determinant of audit quality instead of the integrity of auditors. Also, study two of the dissertation is the first known study to find that aid project failure was mainly due to managerial failure though literature has blamed poor institutions, weak economies, and corruption as the culprits. Though prior audit quality studies have used responses from auditors, most recent researches in that domain have used data from sources other than auditors, yet auditors are the people who actually perform the work. The finding that auditors' perceptions about the core determinant of audit quality is integrity and not independence suggests that perhaps custodians of the profession have not focused on the fundamental character determinant of audit quality. This finding makes a contribution to theory and practice.

Download or read book Professional Scepticism of Auditors written by Medhat Endrawes and published by . This book was released on 2010 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This study examines the effect of culture, the risk of fraud and errors, accountability and audit knowledge on auditors' professional scepticism, which is necessary to assess the risk of material misstatements due to fraud and error. Information from a sample of 269 junior and senior auditors from three accounting firms from Egypt and Australia were collected. The subjects evaluated the risk of fraud and error at the planning stage. The results provide evidence as to whether auditors from different cultural backgrounds react differently to audit evidence. The results show that there are significant differences between the two countries with respect to some audit decisions but not in others.

Download or read book The Routledge Handbook of Accounting Ethics written by Eileen Z. Taylor and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2020-12-29 with total page 511 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The perspective of this book is to present "ethics" as a conversation about how we decide what is good or bad, right or wrong. It is a collection of conversations employed by educators to assist accounting students in developing their understanding of accounting's ethical aspects and to help them develop into critical thinkers who consider the ethical complexities of the function of accounting in human society. Because we are social beings, ethics is a central human concern, since it involves determining the ethicality of human actions and their effect on other individuals, as well as determining the collective societal acceptance or rejection of an action. Thus, the book’s primary goal is to call attention to the intersectionality of accounting and ethics and to encourage students and researchers to consider the ethical implications of accounting decisions. The book contains a diversity of perspectives within which discussions of accountants' and accounting's ethical responsibilities may occur. The contributing authors were deliberately chosen for their diverse perspectives on whence moral guidance for accounting may come. Each chapter stands on its own and represents the thinking of its authors. The book is not a primer on correct behavior for accountants but a place where educators may spur the conversation along.

Download or read book Government Auditing Standards written by Government Accounting Office and published by www.Militarybookshop.CompanyUK. This book was released on 2012 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Newly revised in 2011. Contains the auditing standards promulgated by the Comptroller General of the United States. Known as the Yellow Book. Includes the professional standards and guidance, commonly referred to as generally accepted government auditing standards (GAGAS), which provide a framework for conducting high quality government audits and attestation engagements with competence, integrity, objectivity, and independence. These standards are for use by auditors of government entities and entities that receive government awards and audit organizations performing GAGAS audits and attestation engagements.

Download or read book Handbook of Trust Research written by Reinhard Bachmann and published by Edward Elgar Publishing. This book was released on 2006-01-01 with total page 456 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In recent times, research on trust has become a major field in the domain of management and in the social sciences as a whole. The Handbook of Trust Research presents a timely and comprehensive account of the most important work undertaken in this lively and emerging field over the past ten to fifteen years. Presenting a broad range of approaches to issues on trust, the Handbook features 22 articles from a variety of disciplines on the study of trust in both organizational and societal contexts. With contributions from some of the most eminent names in the field of trust research, this international collaboration is an imaginative and informative reference tool to aid research in this engaging area for years to come. The Handbook contributes to an area of key importance to almost every aspect of business and society and, in particular, it will appeal to students and scholars of organization theory, strategy and organizational psychology.

Download or read book An Examination of Issues Related to Professional Skepticism in Auditing written by Erin Burrell Nickell and published by . This book was released on 2012 with total page 75 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The third general standard of fieldwork requires auditors to maintain a skeptical mindset with regards to the collection and critical assessment of audit evidence. While professional skepticism is frequently referenced by professional standards, a lack of precision in defining the concept presumably leads to variation in how skepticism is exercised in practice. Drawing on theories from the fields of psychology, economics and organizational justice, this dissertation considers different perspectives of what constitutes sufficient professional skepticism and examines how those perspectives differ between audit practitioners and regulators. First, I consider competing perspectives of professional skepticism--neutral versus presumptive doubt--and whether asking auditors to adopt alternative perspectives of skepticism may have implications for audit efficiency and effectiveness. While, too little skepticism may endanger audit effectiveness and lead to audit failure or enforcement action, too much skepticism may arguably lead to unnecessary costs and inefficiency. Second, I consider whether the nature of the auditor-client relationship threatens an auditor's ability to maintain an attitude of professional skepticism. For example, theoretical perspectives from the fields of psychology and economics suggest that auditors may, consciously or unconsciously, be less skeptical of clients with whom they have developed close, positive working relationships or financial dependencies. More specifically, I consider whether skeptical behavior is impeded by management who display low-risk attitudes towards fraud or by client's who are considered to be highly important to the profitability of the local office. Finally, I examine how professional skepticism is defined from a regulator's perspective. When a public company is accused of fraudulent financial reporting, regulators may determine that the audit performed on the fraudulent financial statements was deficient. Prior research has suggested that in such cases, insufficient skepticism is often a leading cause of alleged audit failure. Within a fairness theory framework, this study examines enforcement actions against auditors between 1999 and 2009, and identifies certain factors that are associated with a citation for a lack of professional skepticism. Overall, results suggest that regulators approach the issue by determining whether auditors should have been more skeptical. Factors found to affect this determination include whether the auditor was perceived as having been aware of an elevated risk of fraud or whether the client was accused of having provided the auditor with false or misleading information during the course of their investigation.

Download or read book Advances in Accounting Behavioral Research written by Khondkar E. Karim and published by Emerald Group Publishing. This book was released on 2023-03-13 with total page 270 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Volume 26 of Advances in Accounting Behavioral Research compiles innovative and new explorations into the behavioral aspects of accounting and auditing including the effects of organizational commitment, the impact of stressors on performance, the effects of auditor familiarity and the examination of personality traits.