Developing critical thinking: An examination of contemporary practices in accounting

Employers and professional bodies call for higher education accounting courses to emphasise the importance of critical thinking skills. This study provides an in-depth assessment of how critical thinking is currently taught and assessed across an entire accounting degree. Our study contributes to our understanding of how teaching and assessment can support students in developing their critical thinking. Using a case study approach, we identify resource restraints and disruptions to traditional forms of engagement as key challenges to developing critical thinking skills in accounting education. We conclude with suggestions for teaching practice, such as formative scaffolds and teacher-led discussions.     

Accountancy capstone: Enhancing integration and professional identity

Capstone units are generally seen to have three main aims: integrating the program, reflecting on prior learning, and transitioning into the workplace. However, research indicates that most programs do not achieve outcomes in all three areas with Henscheid (2000) revealing that integration is the major goal of many capstone programs. As well, in the accounting education literature there has been little empirical evidence relating to the effectiveness of student learning as a result of implementing a capstone unit.     

Budgetary governance and accountability in public sector organisations: An institutional and critical realism approach

This paper analyses the impact of the institutionalisation of governance and budgetary policies on the accountability of organisational actors from an institutional and critical realism perspective. The study extends the framework by Burns and Scapens (2000) to critical realism. Findings from field studies conducted in two public hospital districts in Finland show two institutions of budgetary governance: the political and the technical. Accountability practices depend on how the institutionalised policies have reduced or increased the gaps between the real, the actual and the empirical domains of reality of the organisational actors involved and the governance policy that prevails at a given domain of reality. The use of budgetary information as a tool of governance and accountability in the empirical field of the study cannot be taken for granted.     

Developing Accounting Students' Listening Skills: Barriers,Opportunities and an Integrated Stakeholder Approach

Accountants and employers of accounting graduates consider listening to be among the most important communication skills that graduates possess. However, accounting education practices that develop students' listening skills are uncommon. Further, in the case of listening development, the current approach of prescribing that educators do more to rectify students' skill deficiencies overlooks barriers that prevent greater incorporation of listening instruction in the accounting curriculum. An alternative integrated stakeholder approach to develop students' listening skills is proposed. Informed by a broad range of education literature, the approach identifies cross-disciplinary listening development best practice and barriers to the widespread implementation of such practices in the typical accounting programme, before determining and assigning interrelated listening development roles to key stakeholders who will benefit from improved student listening. While student listening development is feasible under the proposed approach, shared contributions by accounting students, the profession and educators are needed to achieve enhanced skills outcomes.     

Accounting information systems and learning theory: an integrated approach to teaching

A background to the adoption of computing in accounting education is discussed. There has been considerable pressure by the accounting profession for information technology to be taught in tertiary accounting courses. While accommodating these expectations, accounting academics have been concerned that such teaching should focus on conceptual understanding, rather than training. Research on effectiveness of computers and the learning of accounting concepts has been considered and found to be inconclusive and conflicting. It has been argued that an understanding of learning theory is necessary to enhance the effectiveness of teaching computerized accounting. An approach to teaching computerized accounting information systems and integrating learning theories is presented via a practical example: the objectives of teaching computerized accounting and reasons for adopting the SYBIZ Rev L software package are presented. The chosen approach in developing the teaching and learning material is outlined and linked to learning theory. It is argued that computers in accounting education should not merely be treated as a fait accompli, but be recognized as a part of a process which we should understand and influence. Research needs to continue on a number of methodological fronts. Suggestions are given for more specific empirical research, as well as suggestions on how to incorporate the findings of other related disciplines.     

Evaluating the use of an integrated forest land-use planning approach in addressing forest ecosystem services conflicting demands: Experience within an Irish forest landscape

There is an increasing demand for genuine public participation in Sustainable Forest Management (SFM) planning to address the various demands for forests to deliver a range of ecosystem services. However, as of yet, there are few developed and tested mechanisms to help authorities and stakeholders with diverse interests to effectively work together to reach a common goal. Integrated Forest Land-Use Planning (IFLUP) is an approach that has the potential to accommodate multi-stakeholders’ demands in the field of SFM planning. In this paper an IFLUP framework process that facilitates stakeholder participation in future-oriented SFM planning is explored. This framework combines scenario analysis and stakeholder collaborative learning. Its application in a case study area in the West of Ireland is outlined and its effectiveness in accommodating conflicting stakeholder demands on forest ecosystem services as well as its potential opportunities and challenges are evaluated.Based on the results and participants evaluation feedback of the IFLUP workshop outcomes, there was a shared view that the IFLUP approach has potential to address conflicting societal demands on forest ecosystem services within local forest landscapes. Likewise, collaborative learning process helps build trust and respect among stakeholder groups as well as improving the legitimacy and acceptance of SFM planning outcomes.     

In defence of triangulation: A critical realist approach to mixed methods research in management accounting

The notion of triangulation constitutes a key component of mixed methods research but has been contested on ontological and epistemological grounds, especially where this entails integration of theories and/or methods rooted in different philosophical assumptions (or paradigms). Drawing on critical realism, this paper addresses two criticisms of the use of triangulation in mixed methods research straddling between the functionalist and interpretive paradigms, namely (1) its propensity to suppress variations in situated meanings and (2) its treatment of empirical observations as objectively verifiable rather than inherently theory-related. The modified notion of triangulation advanced in this paper counters these criticisms by re-conceptualizing it as firmly grounded in abductive reasoning. This provides a foundation for maintaining researchers’ sensitivity to context-specific variations in meanings in efforts to derive theory-related explanations. The possibilities of using such a modified notion of triangulation in management accounting research are illustrated through a review of two empirical studies straddling between the functionalist and interpretive paradigms.     

Students' Perceptions of a Scaffolded Approach to Learning Financial Planning: An Empirical Study

In the aftermath of the global financial crisis (GFC), one understandable area of scrutiny and pressure for reform is the educational background and professionalism of personal financial advisers. This Australian study reports on a three-year investigation into students' perceptions of ‘scaffolded’ instruction in financial planning. The scaffolded approach was used to assist learning in areas that previously had caused difficulty. The results indicate that students perceived the scaffolded tasks to be valuable learning experiences which increased their appreciation of the skills and knowledge required by financial advisers. Although students may bring different frames of reference to their learning, and the positiveness of perceived value of scaffolded instruction may vary between different demographic groupings, scaffolding techniques are shown to provide strong potential to assist university educators and their students in financial planning.     

An integrated approach for green design: Life-cycle,fuzzy AHP and environmental management accounting

The growing awareness of environmental issues has made the design of eco-friendly products a critical task for modern businesses. Almost all the costs and the environmental performance of a product over its life-cycle are determined in its design and development phase. The selection of alternative green designs is, however, a major challenge in today's competitive environment. The increasing pressure on time-to-market conflicts with the analytical approach typically required when using conventional environmental management accounting (EMA) tools such as Life-Cycle Assessment (LCA) and Life-Cycle Costing (LCC). This paper introduces a comprehensive method that integrates the LCA and EMA concepts, fuzzy logic and Analytical Hierarchical Process (AHP), to measure the environmental and organisational performance of different designs. We propose a screening model to help designers reduce their reliance on LCA and present a case study to demonstrate that this approach provides a systematic method of evaluating alternative designs and identifying product design improvement options. The measurement approach presented in this research can help companies reduce development lead time by screening out undesirable design options. More importantly, the approach can be modelled with the mere use of an Excel spreadsheet, which means limited resources are needed to implement the proposed method.     

Monetary policy and financial (in)stability: An integrated micro–macro approach

Evidence on central banks’ twin objective, monetary and financial stability, is scarce. We suggest an integrated micro–macro approach with two core virtues. First, we measure financial stability directly at the bank level as the probability of distress. Second, we integrate a microeconomic hazard model for bank distress and a standard macroeconomic model. The advantage of this approach is to incorporate micro information, to allow for non-linearities and to permit general feedback effects between financial distress and the real economy. We base the analysis on German bank and macro data between 1995 and 2004. Our results confirm the existence of a trade-off between monetary and financial stability. An unexpected tightening of monetary policy increases the probability of distress. This effect disappears when neglecting microeffects and non-linearities, underlining their importance. Distress responses are largest for small cooperative banks, weak distress events, and at times when capitalization is low. An important policy implication is that the separation of financial supervision and monetary policy requires close collaboration among members in the European System of Central Banks and national bank supervisors.     

Hybrid performance evaluation of sustainable service and manufacturing supply chain management: An integrated approach of fuzzy dematel and fuzzy inference system

The aim of this paper is to propose a comprehensive framework for simultaneously measuring the performance of sustainable service and manufacturing supply chain management. Application of the proposed approach also results in reduced uncertainty of the performance measurement process caused by qualitative criteria evaluation. The proposed approach consists of two main steps. First, the fuzzy decision‐making trial and evaluation laboratory (DEMATEL) method has been used to determine important criteria by avoiding low influences; and then a Mamdani fuzzy inference system model has been adopted and applied for performance evaluation of sustainable supply chain management (SSCM). This model is employed in order to cope with the vagueness that exists in the SSCM performance investigation due to the vagueness intrinsic in the evaluation of criteria. In the proposed model, human reasoning has been modelled with fuzzy inference rules and has been set in the system, which is an advantage compared with those models in which fuzzy set theory and multicriteria decision‐making models are integrated. The proposed approach has been implemented in the pipe and fitting industry in order to highlight its application in real life. Sensitivity analysis has been carried out to determine the influence of service and manufacturing criteria on SSCM performance. The findings reveal that sustainable manufacturing criteria compared with sustainable service criteria have more effect on the performance of SSCM.