Environmental consequences increasingly influence management strategy and choice. This study inve... more Environmental consequences increasingly influence management strategy and choice. This study investigates the effects on attention and investment of: (a) incorporating environmental data into a balanced scorecard (BSC), called the sustainability balanced score card (SBSC), and, (b) the organization of environmental accounting information. Design/method/approach: In a between-participant design, participants (n ≈ 95) chose from among two investments using BSCs. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three conditions: (a) no environmental data (control or BSC condition), (b) environmental data embedded within the traditional BSC (four-perspective SBSC) or (c) environmental data added to a BSC as a standalone fifth perspective (five-perspective SBSC). Findings: Environmentally friendly investment was greater with the four-perspective SBSC than the traditional BSC. In addition, participants were most efficient, i.e., spent the least total time, and least time per data element examined, with the four-perspective SBSC. Finally, the time spent examining, and decision weight given to, environmental data were uncorrelated. Research limitations/implications: Professional managers and accountants may have greater knowledge of environmental metrics than do students, who are the participants in this study; greater knowledge of environmental metrics may lessen the extent of display effects on judgments; hence, the results may not generalize to knowledgeable professionals. Future research can test this speculation by exploring the influence of knowledge on judgments in this context. Practical implications: The form (i.e., organization) of environmental accounting data changed the allocation of attention while the presence of environmental accounting data changed participants' investments; hence, both the presence, and form, of environmental accounting information matters. Originality/value: This study is among the first to show differing influences from both the presence and organization of environmental accounting data on attention and investment.
This paper reviews the emerging computer-aided text analysis (CATA) accounting literature through... more This paper reviews the emerging computer-aided text analysis (CATA) accounting literature through proposing a model of the corpus linguistic research production process, followed by analysis of the main text archival data sources in published papers in the Top Six accounting journals from 2010 to 2016. Reviewed papers appear in a 5 3 5 matrix that includes five categories of text data (i.e., SEC filings, conference call transcripts, earnings press releases, financial analyst reports, and other sources) and five categories of text measures (i.e., tone, readability, similarity, firm characteristics and environment, and other measures). A brief review of the CATA literature published in two AIS journals is followed by a summary of the tools and KS (knowledge and skills) observed in the reviewed research. Finally, we offer implications by discussing four issues related to CATA accounting research. We conclude that the emerging CATA accounting research offers unique opportunities for knowledgeable AIS scholars.
Journal of experimental psychology. General, Jan 28, 2018
Evidence suggests that experiencing financial insecurity lowers well-being and increases problema... more Evidence suggests that experiencing financial insecurity lowers well-being and increases problematic financial behaviors. The present article employs a self-determination theory (SDT; R. M. Ryan & Deci, 2000a) perspective to understand the mechanisms by which experiencing financial insecurity contributes to these detrimental outcomes. Informed by SDT, we expected that the basic psychological needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness would drive these effects. Studies were concerned with individuals' general experiences of financial insecurity (using community samples; Studies 1 and 2), and employed manipulations involving self-reflection (Study 3) and hypothetical scenarios (Study 4). Findings demonstrated that financially insecure conditions undermined basic psychological needs and lowered well-being (measured in terms of self-esteem, depression, and anxiety). In addition, lower satisfaction of basic psychological needs linked financial insecurity to a greater likelihood ...
Managers can use private information to strategically misrepresent costs and consume additional r... more Managers can use private information to strategically misrepresent costs and consume additional resources at the expense of the firm. However, past research has demonstrated that managers do not always fully misrepresent, thus failing to display economically rational decision making. This paper proposes that misrepresentation is a joint function of managers' economic self interest and situation-dependent, fairness beliefs. Specifically, managers choose a culturally defensible fairness belief that maximizes self-interest, given an initial -advantaged‖ or -disadvantaged‖ economic position. Experimental results show that -advantaged‖ managers, i.e., those who receive more than do comparable managers misrepresent less, while -disadvantaged‖ managers, i.e., those who receive less than do comparable managers misrepresent more. An accounting decision aid that increases the salience of the consequences of the misrepresentation increases this effect. The results suggest that managers' initial economic positions influence implemented fairness beliefs.
Existing research assumes but does not investigate accounting technology professionals' (ATPs) mo... more Existing research assumes but does not investigate accounting technology professionals' (ATPs) motivation. ATPs motivations matter because of the instability and ubiquity of accounting technologies, and, ATPs boundary spanning role between accounting artifacts and computing technologies. Positivist and critical theory research make strong assumptions about, but leave largely uninvestigated, ATPs motivations. Self-determination theory (SDT), which originates in humanistic psychology, offers an unexplored alternative theory of ATP motivation. SDT suggests a set of propositions for proactively engaging ATPs in self-motivated, socially meaningful activities that enhance ATPs wellbeing, and, for rethinking accounting education towards a more proactive role in attracting and engaging socially aware, ethically responsible ATPs.
Understanding accounting stakeholders', including customers', perceptions of accountant's job per... more Understanding accounting stakeholders', including customers', perceptions of accountant's job performance and motivation is important to improving customer service, understanding the changing nature of accounting work, and, preparing accountants for professional practice. Herein, we compare the perceptions of three highly experienced groups of accounting stakeholders (i.e., 179 accountants, 286 customers, and 150 supervisors) of accountants' job performance and motivation at the United States Army
The phenomenal growth of e-commerce and online auctions is exceeded only by the corresponding gro... more The phenomenal growth of e-commerce and online auctions is exceeded only by the corresponding growth in e-commerce and online auction fraud. Herein, we report two pilot studies that use eBay data, and the Bell & Whaley (1991) taxonomy of cheating, to investigate the nature and frequency of online auction deception. Study one (n = 24) categorizes a one-week sample of online transactions into deception strategies in two general classes (i.e., hiding versus showing) and three strategic domains (i.e., product, seller, and transaction characteristics).
Bugscope is an emerging educational technology project that allows students and teachers across K... more Bugscope is an emerging educational technology project that allows students and teachers across K-12 to study insects and other arthropods through remote access and control of an environmental scanning electron microscope from their classroom computers. Teachers and students in 33 schools from 18 states in the United States and the US Virgin Islands were selected to participate during the first year of the project. This paper provides an overview and a formative evaluation of the project in order to assess its current impact and to guide further development.
The importance of public speaking (PS) skills to professional accounting success motivates improv... more The importance of public speaking (PS) skills to professional accounting success motivates improving students' self-perceptions of these skills. In addition, evidence of higher levels of public speaking apprehension (PSA) among accounting majors makes understanding and working with students' affective (emotive) reactions to PS critical to their future success. In three studies, we design and implement an intervention based on principles from self-determination theory (SDT) and motivational interviewing (MI). Its purpose is to improve students' PSA and PS motivation; it includes substantive PS instruction, dialogues, nonjudgmental feedback, and interpersonal support. The results of the three ''proof-of-concept'' interventions (Study 1, n ϭ 23; Study 2, n ϭ 14; Study 3, n ϭ 36) suggest improvements in students' perceptions of their PS cognition, motivation, and affect. Despite the limitations of self-reported measures and exclusively graduate participants, the results suggest that (1) the interventions, described in appendices, may merit replication and extension, and (2) SDT-and MIbased interventions may prove useful in addressing aspects of accountancy pedagogy that induce student apprehension.
Accounting, Management and Information Technologies, 1991
... Hirschheim, R., Smithson, S. A critical analysis of information systems evaluation. ... Steve... more ... Hirschheim, R., Smithson, S. A critical analysis of information systems evaluation. ... Steven Kyle is a Certified Financial Planner (CFP) and CPA with 12 years of experience in personal financial planning. Harold Wilson is a real estate broker with 14 years of ex perience. ...
Page 1. Formalized Dissent and Cognitive Complexity in Group Processes and Performance* Dan N. St... more Page 1. Formalized Dissent and Cognitive Complexity in Group Processes and Performance* Dan N. Stone Depanment of Accountancy and Information Systems, University of Illinois, Champaign, IL 61 820 Marcos P. Sivitanides ...
Page 1. Drcision Scicnees Volume 28 Number 3 Summer 1997 Printed in the USA Representations as De... more Page 1. Drcision Scicnees Volume 28 Number 3 Summer 1997 Printed in the USA Representations as Decision Aids: The Asymmetric Effects of Words and Numbers on Auditors' Inherent Risk Judgments' William N. Dilla School ...
ABSTRACT This article investigates the Holland model of occupational choice's (HMOC) deve... more ABSTRACT This article investigates the Holland model of occupational choice's (HMOC) development, influence, and validity in relation to its classification of bookkeepers, accountants, and business professionals. Study 1 reanalyzes published data and provides evidence that the Beancounter-Bookkeeper (BB) stereotype, which is promoted in the HMOC, is partially predictive of the personality characteristics of individuals who choose to enter professional accountancy. Study 2 investigates the influence of HMOC training, and exposure to accounting education, on perceptions of the personality type needed for accounting work; results indicate that: (1) HMOC training is associated with perceptions that accounting work requires a BB personality, and (2) the importance of investigative skills to accounting work increase with accounting education. Following this, we review evidence that suggests low validity in the HMOC's claims of greater job success and satisfaction among BB accountants. Finally, we consider three possible processes that may explain Holland and colleagues’ conjoining of accountants with bookkeepers. Together, the analysis promotes skepticism regarding whether the HMOC's claim that professional accounting success demands a passive, compliant, subservient, i.e., BB, personality supports the public interest obligations of professional accountants.
Many accounting judgments can be characterized as diagnostic tasks in which accountants, auditors... more Many accounting judgments can be characterized as diagnostic tasks in which accountants, auditors, managers, or investors are called upon to discriminate among possible states and decide which one exists (e.g., bankruptcy predictions, stock buy-sell recommendations, going concern judgments, error or fraud detection). To measure the accuracy of such decisions, most accounting studies employ percentage correct, a measure which has been shown to be both invalid and unreliable. This paper describes Signal Detection Theory (SDT), a theoretical model of the diagnostic task that has been empirically supported in many fields, and discusses advantages of employing SDT in accounting research. We also employ SDT procedures and measures to reanalyze data related to two previously published accounting studies, one based upon experimental data and one based upon archival data. The SDT-based reanalysis reveal important additional insights in both studies.
Environmental consequences increasingly influence management strategy and choice. This study inve... more Environmental consequences increasingly influence management strategy and choice. This study investigates the effects on attention and investment of: (a) incorporating environmental data into a balanced scorecard (BSC), called the sustainability balanced score card (SBSC), and, (b) the organization of environmental accounting information. Design/method/approach: In a between-participant design, participants (n ≈ 95) chose from among two investments using BSCs. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three conditions: (a) no environmental data (control or BSC condition), (b) environmental data embedded within the traditional BSC (four-perspective SBSC) or (c) environmental data added to a BSC as a standalone fifth perspective (five-perspective SBSC). Findings: Environmentally friendly investment was greater with the four-perspective SBSC than the traditional BSC. In addition, participants were most efficient, i.e., spent the least total time, and least time per data element examined, with the four-perspective SBSC. Finally, the time spent examining, and decision weight given to, environmental data were uncorrelated. Research limitations/implications: Professional managers and accountants may have greater knowledge of environmental metrics than do students, who are the participants in this study; greater knowledge of environmental metrics may lessen the extent of display effects on judgments; hence, the results may not generalize to knowledgeable professionals. Future research can test this speculation by exploring the influence of knowledge on judgments in this context. Practical implications: The form (i.e., organization) of environmental accounting data changed the allocation of attention while the presence of environmental accounting data changed participants' investments; hence, both the presence, and form, of environmental accounting information matters. Originality/value: This study is among the first to show differing influences from both the presence and organization of environmental accounting data on attention and investment.
This paper reviews the emerging computer-aided text analysis (CATA) accounting literature through... more This paper reviews the emerging computer-aided text analysis (CATA) accounting literature through proposing a model of the corpus linguistic research production process, followed by analysis of the main text archival data sources in published papers in the Top Six accounting journals from 2010 to 2016. Reviewed papers appear in a 5 3 5 matrix that includes five categories of text data (i.e., SEC filings, conference call transcripts, earnings press releases, financial analyst reports, and other sources) and five categories of text measures (i.e., tone, readability, similarity, firm characteristics and environment, and other measures). A brief review of the CATA literature published in two AIS journals is followed by a summary of the tools and KS (knowledge and skills) observed in the reviewed research. Finally, we offer implications by discussing four issues related to CATA accounting research. We conclude that the emerging CATA accounting research offers unique opportunities for knowledgeable AIS scholars.
Journal of experimental psychology. General, Jan 28, 2018
Evidence suggests that experiencing financial insecurity lowers well-being and increases problema... more Evidence suggests that experiencing financial insecurity lowers well-being and increases problematic financial behaviors. The present article employs a self-determination theory (SDT; R. M. Ryan & Deci, 2000a) perspective to understand the mechanisms by which experiencing financial insecurity contributes to these detrimental outcomes. Informed by SDT, we expected that the basic psychological needs for autonomy, competence, and relatedness would drive these effects. Studies were concerned with individuals' general experiences of financial insecurity (using community samples; Studies 1 and 2), and employed manipulations involving self-reflection (Study 3) and hypothetical scenarios (Study 4). Findings demonstrated that financially insecure conditions undermined basic psychological needs and lowered well-being (measured in terms of self-esteem, depression, and anxiety). In addition, lower satisfaction of basic psychological needs linked financial insecurity to a greater likelihood ...
Managers can use private information to strategically misrepresent costs and consume additional r... more Managers can use private information to strategically misrepresent costs and consume additional resources at the expense of the firm. However, past research has demonstrated that managers do not always fully misrepresent, thus failing to display economically rational decision making. This paper proposes that misrepresentation is a joint function of managers' economic self interest and situation-dependent, fairness beliefs. Specifically, managers choose a culturally defensible fairness belief that maximizes self-interest, given an initial -advantaged‖ or -disadvantaged‖ economic position. Experimental results show that -advantaged‖ managers, i.e., those who receive more than do comparable managers misrepresent less, while -disadvantaged‖ managers, i.e., those who receive less than do comparable managers misrepresent more. An accounting decision aid that increases the salience of the consequences of the misrepresentation increases this effect. The results suggest that managers' initial economic positions influence implemented fairness beliefs.
Existing research assumes but does not investigate accounting technology professionals' (ATPs) mo... more Existing research assumes but does not investigate accounting technology professionals' (ATPs) motivation. ATPs motivations matter because of the instability and ubiquity of accounting technologies, and, ATPs boundary spanning role between accounting artifacts and computing technologies. Positivist and critical theory research make strong assumptions about, but leave largely uninvestigated, ATPs motivations. Self-determination theory (SDT), which originates in humanistic psychology, offers an unexplored alternative theory of ATP motivation. SDT suggests a set of propositions for proactively engaging ATPs in self-motivated, socially meaningful activities that enhance ATPs wellbeing, and, for rethinking accounting education towards a more proactive role in attracting and engaging socially aware, ethically responsible ATPs.
Understanding accounting stakeholders', including customers', perceptions of accountant's job per... more Understanding accounting stakeholders', including customers', perceptions of accountant's job performance and motivation is important to improving customer service, understanding the changing nature of accounting work, and, preparing accountants for professional practice. Herein, we compare the perceptions of three highly experienced groups of accounting stakeholders (i.e., 179 accountants, 286 customers, and 150 supervisors) of accountants' job performance and motivation at the United States Army
The phenomenal growth of e-commerce and online auctions is exceeded only by the corresponding gro... more The phenomenal growth of e-commerce and online auctions is exceeded only by the corresponding growth in e-commerce and online auction fraud. Herein, we report two pilot studies that use eBay data, and the Bell & Whaley (1991) taxonomy of cheating, to investigate the nature and frequency of online auction deception. Study one (n = 24) categorizes a one-week sample of online transactions into deception strategies in two general classes (i.e., hiding versus showing) and three strategic domains (i.e., product, seller, and transaction characteristics).
Bugscope is an emerging educational technology project that allows students and teachers across K... more Bugscope is an emerging educational technology project that allows students and teachers across K-12 to study insects and other arthropods through remote access and control of an environmental scanning electron microscope from their classroom computers. Teachers and students in 33 schools from 18 states in the United States and the US Virgin Islands were selected to participate during the first year of the project. This paper provides an overview and a formative evaluation of the project in order to assess its current impact and to guide further development.
The importance of public speaking (PS) skills to professional accounting success motivates improv... more The importance of public speaking (PS) skills to professional accounting success motivates improving students' self-perceptions of these skills. In addition, evidence of higher levels of public speaking apprehension (PSA) among accounting majors makes understanding and working with students' affective (emotive) reactions to PS critical to their future success. In three studies, we design and implement an intervention based on principles from self-determination theory (SDT) and motivational interviewing (MI). Its purpose is to improve students' PSA and PS motivation; it includes substantive PS instruction, dialogues, nonjudgmental feedback, and interpersonal support. The results of the three ''proof-of-concept'' interventions (Study 1, n ϭ 23; Study 2, n ϭ 14; Study 3, n ϭ 36) suggest improvements in students' perceptions of their PS cognition, motivation, and affect. Despite the limitations of self-reported measures and exclusively graduate participants, the results suggest that (1) the interventions, described in appendices, may merit replication and extension, and (2) SDT-and MIbased interventions may prove useful in addressing aspects of accountancy pedagogy that induce student apprehension.
Accounting, Management and Information Technologies, 1991
... Hirschheim, R., Smithson, S. A critical analysis of information systems evaluation. ... Steve... more ... Hirschheim, R., Smithson, S. A critical analysis of information systems evaluation. ... Steven Kyle is a Certified Financial Planner (CFP) and CPA with 12 years of experience in personal financial planning. Harold Wilson is a real estate broker with 14 years of ex perience. ...
Page 1. Formalized Dissent and Cognitive Complexity in Group Processes and Performance* Dan N. St... more Page 1. Formalized Dissent and Cognitive Complexity in Group Processes and Performance* Dan N. Stone Depanment of Accountancy and Information Systems, University of Illinois, Champaign, IL 61 820 Marcos P. Sivitanides ...
Page 1. Drcision Scicnees Volume 28 Number 3 Summer 1997 Printed in the USA Representations as De... more Page 1. Drcision Scicnees Volume 28 Number 3 Summer 1997 Printed in the USA Representations as Decision Aids: The Asymmetric Effects of Words and Numbers on Auditors' Inherent Risk Judgments' William N. Dilla School ...
ABSTRACT This article investigates the Holland model of occupational choice's (HMOC) deve... more ABSTRACT This article investigates the Holland model of occupational choice's (HMOC) development, influence, and validity in relation to its classification of bookkeepers, accountants, and business professionals. Study 1 reanalyzes published data and provides evidence that the Beancounter-Bookkeeper (BB) stereotype, which is promoted in the HMOC, is partially predictive of the personality characteristics of individuals who choose to enter professional accountancy. Study 2 investigates the influence of HMOC training, and exposure to accounting education, on perceptions of the personality type needed for accounting work; results indicate that: (1) HMOC training is associated with perceptions that accounting work requires a BB personality, and (2) the importance of investigative skills to accounting work increase with accounting education. Following this, we review evidence that suggests low validity in the HMOC's claims of greater job success and satisfaction among BB accountants. Finally, we consider three possible processes that may explain Holland and colleagues’ conjoining of accountants with bookkeepers. Together, the analysis promotes skepticism regarding whether the HMOC's claim that professional accounting success demands a passive, compliant, subservient, i.e., BB, personality supports the public interest obligations of professional accountants.
Many accounting judgments can be characterized as diagnostic tasks in which accountants, auditors... more Many accounting judgments can be characterized as diagnostic tasks in which accountants, auditors, managers, or investors are called upon to discriminate among possible states and decide which one exists (e.g., bankruptcy predictions, stock buy-sell recommendations, going concern judgments, error or fraud detection). To measure the accuracy of such decisions, most accounting studies employ percentage correct, a measure which has been shown to be both invalid and unreliable. This paper describes Signal Detection Theory (SDT), a theoretical model of the diagnostic task that has been empirically supported in many fields, and discusses advantages of employing SDT in accounting research. We also employ SDT procedures and measures to reanalyze data related to two previously published accounting studies, one based upon experimental data and one based upon archival data. The SDT-based reanalysis reveal important additional insights in both studies.
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