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Abstract

In this study, first year commerce students in Australia were surveyed about their perceptions of their accounting studies and their perceptions of the attributes required of professional accountants. The paper specifically addresses the factors important in determining whether first year students intend to become accountants. The study uses a logistic regression model incorporating demographic and academic factors, as well as students' perceptions of the work of accountants, to predict intention to become an accountant. The results show that the perception of importance of generic skills, intrinsic interest in the discipline area, and course satisfaction were significant in determining intention to pursue a career as an accountant. As many students formed their judgments about the work of accountants from their accounting studies, the findings have implications for accounting educators in terms of the enthusiasm and motivation required in teaching accounting, as well as curriculum development that reflects the skill set required for an increasingly sophisticated business environment.     

An empirical study of factors affecting accounting students' career choice in New Zealand

This study examines the influence of intrinsic factors; financial and job-related factors; other factors such as parent and peer influence and work experience; exposure to high school accounting; and the students' perceived benefit-cost ratio to being a chartered accountant, on whether accounting students choose to pursue a chartered accountancy (CA) career or a non-accounting career. Based on a survey of 295 students from five universities in New Zealand, the results show that the students who intend to pursue a CA career place significantly greater importance on financial and job-related factors and perceived benefit-cost ratio than those who choose a non-accounting career. Intrinsic factors, other factors and exposure to high school accounting have no significant influence on the decision whether to select a CA career. A discriminant analysis revealed that financial and jobrelated factors have the highest explanatory power differentiating the two groups, followed by the students' perception of benefits and costs associated with a CA career. The results have important implications for recruitment into the accounting profession in New Zealand.     

Accounting Undergraduates' Perceptions of Cooperative Learning as a Model for Enhancing their Interpersonal and Communication Skills to Interface Successfully with Professional Accountancy Education and Training

To interface effectively with professional accountancy training, accounting educationalists should ensure that they turn out graduates who possess the interpersonal and communication skills required of today's accountant. Attainment of these skills is promoted by group work. However, little empirical evidence exists to help academics make an informed choice about which form of group learning enhances interpersonal and communication skills. This paper addresses this deficiency by comparing perceptions of skills enhancement between accounting students who experienced traditional or simple group learning and those who undertook cooperative learning. The findings reveal that the cooperative learning cohort perceived their learning experience to be significantly more effective at enhancing interpersonal and communication skills than that of the simple group learning cohort. This study provides evidence that cooperative learning is a more effective model for delivering interpersonal and communication skills than simple group learning, thereby creating a more successful interface between academic accounting and professional accountancy training.     

Students' experiences of learning in a third-year management accounting class: Evidence from New Zealand

An extensive body of literature in higher education (for example, Marton and Säljö, 1984; Prosser and Trigwell, 1999) explores learning from the perspectives of students. Säljö (1979) formed the basis of Sharma's (1997) first study exploring accountancy students' conceptions of learning. Using an open-ended questionnaire administered to third-year management accounting students, this paper investigates accountancy students' conceptions of learning, and extends Sharma's (1997) study by examining the relationship between conceptions of and approaches to learning, and more specifically students' contextual experiences of learning in lectures and tutorials. Findings indicate that, while some students seek understanding as an outcome of their learning, the majority perceive learning quantitatively in terms of knowledge acquisition, reproduction and application. A new classification of the locus of responsibility for learning as perceived by students suggests that a more distributed concept of responsibility might result in enhanced learning outcomes.     

Students' beliefs,attitudes and intentions to major in accounting

This study extends the literature that uses the theory of planned behaviour in examining the factors that impact on students' intentions to major in accounting and non-accounting disciplines. A survey of a sample of business students enrolled in an introductory accounting course in a New Zealand University was conducted to gather data about their intended academic majors, and their beliefs and attitudes towards majoring in accounting and non-accounting. The results show that three factors (personal, referents, and control) are determinants of students' intention to major in accounting or other business disciplines. Further analysis revealed that the students' major intentions are influenced by important referents' perceptions. In particular, parents appear to have a stronger influence on students' intentions to major in accounting. Comparisons of differential personal perceptions by accounting and non-accounting majors revealed that accounting majors hold positive perceptions of some of the qualities of the study of accounting and the accounting profession. Significant differences were also found in the control perception between accounting and non-accounting major students.     

Perceptions of master of accountancy graduates concerning their job search and employment experiences with public accounting firms

The public accounting profession has been calling for a 150-hour education requirement for new entrants to the profession for over two decades. The rationale for increasing the entry-level education requirement is that since the business world is more dynamic and complex than ever before, new professionals need broader knowledge and skills to be able to cope. Graduates of master of accountancy (MSA) programs would appear to be the type of students that public accounting firms are seeking since they often have intellectual breadth gained through undergraduate degrees in areas other than accountancy, current technical competence in accountancy, and frequently have work experience. This paper reports the results of a study undertaken to determine the perceptions of MSA graduates concerning: (1) how recruiters from public accounting firms viewed their non-accounting academic backgrounds and work experience; (2) how well prepared they were for their first jobs in public accounting as compared to traditional undergraduate accounting majors; and (3) any bias they experienced during the hiring process. The results of this study indicate that although a majority of the respondents who desired careers in public accounting were able to secure jobs in the field, they believed it was harder for them to get jobs in public accounting than their peers with just undergraduate degrees. The majority did not feel that public accounting firms viewed their non-accounting academic backgrounds and work experience favorably. Although more than half believed that they were paid more than their peers who held only undergraduate degrees, less than half felt that they were given more responsibility. The results also indicate that older MSA graduates believed that they were subject to age bias during the interview process.     

The organizational context of professionalism in accounting

This study analyses the degree to which change in the organizational context, content and location (both of the individual within the organization and the organization within the field) of professional work has contributed to variation in attitudes toward professional ideology and institutions. Through an online survey of Canadian chartered accountants we observe that, contrary to current accusations, a majority of accounting professionals remain committed to their profession, despite profound changes in the context, content and location of their work. We do find, however, that the strongest espoused deviation from core professional values and logics has occurred in traditional work contexts (i.e. public accounting firms), and for the distinctive value of commitment to independence enforcement, the deviation is most pronounced in the elite core of the profession – the Big Four professional service firms. Accountants in higher ranks also tend to identify more with commercialistic values. We speculate on the implications these findings hold for the professional project of accountancy.     

Women accountants: Is the grass greener outside the profession?

Studies of professional accountancy firms have indicated a complex process of internal socialisation which shapes the professional and organisational identities of the chartered accountants working within them. These processes have acted as a mechanism for excluding women, hindering their progress and facilitating their exit. Previous evidence suggests that women leave professional accountancy firms in order to accommodate more flexibility, experience less pressure, achieve consistency of hours and hence attain a better work/life balance.In this paper we seek to examine whether the gendered work practices of professional accountancy firms influence female choice to seek alternative employment outside the professional accountancy firm environment. Specifically the paper seeks to answer two research questions (1) why and when do women leave professional accountancy firms? (2) is the working environment outside professional accountancy firms less gendered?Data was collected by means of a postal questionnaire distributed in 2005 to women who had qualified in the years 1990–1995 (n = 1022). Responses were received from 370 women, of whom 100 were employed with professional accountancy firms and 270 employed within industry. In depth interviews were also conducted with 7 partners in professional accountancy firms and 6 women who had left the professional accountancy environment to pursue employment elsewhere.Whilst there was evidence that professional accountancy firms continue to reflect gendered working norms practices, rather than compound the dominant view, this study suggests that the primary reason women leave professional accountancy firms is to seek more interesting work as opposed to obtaining more flexibility in their working lives. In addition, the experiences of the women, the working patterns, and rates of progression were similar irrespective of employment type.     

A Theory of Reasoned Action model of the Chartered Accountant career choice

This paper tests a Theory of Reasoned Action (TRA) model of the business student's choice of a career in Chartered Accountancy (CA). The CA designation is the Canadian equivalent of the American Certified Public Accountant (CPA). The TRA model predicts that a student's choice of a CA career is a function of the student's attitudes towards becoming a CA. In testing the TRA model, we defined attitudes in two ways: first, as the sum of the interactions between beliefs that becoming a CA will lead to certain outcomes and the evaluation of the importance of these outcomes in choosing a career; and second, as a ratio where the numerator is beliefs in the benefits and the denominator is beliefs in the costs of becoming a CA. Based on a survey of 897 graduating business students, we found support for the TRA model. We suggest that accounting recruiters should concentrate on students studying finance and economics and should promote specific outcomes of a CA career such as good long-term earnings, advancement opportunities, variety in the work, chance to make a contribution, and flexibility of career options.     

Breaking the link with a university education in the creation of a chartered accountant: The ICAS story

Accountancy is now well established as an elite professional occupation in most parts of the world and much of this status has been afforded through an association with educational qualifications. The assumption that a university education adds value to individuals, employers and society has led to a massive increase in tertiary education both in the UK and internationally and there is a societal expectation in the UK that a university education is the norm rather than an opportunity reserved for the academically elite. However, within this context, the chartered accounting profession in Scotland (ICAS) is considering opening up training to school leavers and other non-graduates as part of its ‘Fast Forward to 2010’ strategy. Evidence from the sociological literature suggests that any alteration in the educational composition of the members of a professional group may adversely impact upon that group's status and standing in society. In turn, any change in the educational qualifications of the members of a profession risks influencing the perceptions and aspirations of potential recruits.In this study we seek to further our understanding of how potential recruits perceive and evaluate both university education and the accountancy profession as an occupational group. In addition we consider how the school leaver route may be viewed by potential recruits in terms of its impact upon individuals' career aspirations and the overall status of the profession. By collecting data from school pupils from both the public and the private educational sector and first year and final year university undergraduates from a ‘traditional’ and ‘new’ university this study has identified some of the possible consequences of the ICAS proposal and provides insights relevant to an understanding of the professional identity of CAs in the 21st century. As such, our insights may serve to assist policy-makers in understanding the potential consequences of any changes in the educational requirements of future recruits.     

Understanding Factors Leading to Participation in Supplemental Instruction Programs in Introductory Accounting Courses

Abstract

Although studies have shown that supplemental instruction (SI) programs can have positive effects in introductory accounting courses, these programs experience low participation rates. Thus, our study is the first to examine the factors leading to student participation in SI programs. We do this through a survey instrument based on the Theory of Planned Behavior. Our study shows that students' attitudes toward the sessions affect their intent to participate in them. This attitude is influenced by students' perceptions that the sessions can help them in various ways. Results also show that influential others can influence student intent to participate in SI sessions. We also note that students' perceptions of the amount of personal control that they have over going to SI sessions have no effect on their participation in the sessions. We discuss how these findings can be leveraged to increase SI participation rates.     

The Status Of Women Academic Accountants in Australia

This paper reports the findings of a survey of the attributes, career satisfactions and aspirations of Australian Academic Women Accountants (AAWA). The survey sought information about personal characteristics, institutional role expectations and perceptions of gender-related issues involving recruitment, promotion and retention of AAWAs. The data provide not only an interesting insight into respondents' perceptions of a career in academic accounting, but also a comparative measure against which future progress of AAWAs can be evaluated. The paper makes suggestions for facilitating the career paths of AAWAs at both institutional and individual levels.     

ENCOUNTERS WITH NAZISM: BRITISH ACCOUNTANTS AND THE FIFTH INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS ON ACCOUNTING

In 1936 a committee of British accountants chose Nazi Germany as the venue for the Fifth International Congress on Accounting. This event was to constitute the most prominent encounter between the international accountancy profession and the Hitlerian state. The paper examines the reasons why the professional elite in Britain patronised a regime whose racist foundations were transparent and where the vocation of accountancy was being reprofessionalised on the basis of arayanisation and party-state control. The protection of advances into the German market for professional services by some of the major British and American accounting firms encouraged a conciliatory approach toward the National Socialist state. In attending the Congress in 1938 the accounting community entered a highly politicised arena, fraternised with future war criminals, succumbed to Nazi propaganda, and, during the zenith of `appeasement', made utterances which appeared to condone the activities of the fascist state in the realm of accounting and economics. The paper reveals the manner in which the early institutions of international accounting could be captured by an abhorrent regime.     

Computer Aided Learning (CAL) and its impact on the performance of non-specialist accounting undergraduates

This study examines the factors affecting students' performance on an introductory UK undergraduate financial accounting course and changes in students' attitudes and perceptions towards Computer Aided Learning (CAL) and accounting. It differs from previous research in that non-specialist accounting students taught using CAL are studied here. Questionnaire data was collected at the beginning and end of the module and is statistically analysed. Multiple regression analysis on student performance shows that age and attitude towards accounting are significant influences, but that attitude towards CAL and students' entry qualifications are not. Students' perceptions of CAL appear to be affected negatively by its use. The study shows that students are significantly more likely to perceive CAL as easy to use, but significantly less likely to view it as flexible, helpful or useful in improving computer literacy. Students' perceptions of accounting as a subject are also negatively affected. They are shown to be significantly less likely to choose to study accounting and significantly more likely to view accounting as a boring subject, following the completion of a CAL course. The negative impact on students' perceptions and attitudes towards CAL and accounting has implications for extending the use of CAL in order to efficiently redirect limited staff resources. However, given that there is no significant effect on performance this may warrant further consideration by higher education institutions.     

Does the Holland model of occupational choice (HMOC) perpetuate the Beancounter-Bookkeeper (BB) stereotype of accountants?

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.     

Is it Shameful to be an Accountant? GenMe Perception(s) of Accountants' Ethics

The function that accountants fulfil in the economic system is dependent on their ability to maintain the perception of high ethical standards. Building on the idea that birth cohorts, otherwise known as generations, are a useful proxy for the socio‐cultural environment of different time periods, we focus on the so‐called ‘GenMe’, that is, students and young workers born in the 1980s and 1990s. In particular, combining the accounting and business ethics literature, the purpose of our paper is to contribute to an increased awareness of the GenMe perceptions of accountants, with special attention given to ethical aspects. We believe that the perceptions of this age group are particularly crucial for the future of the accounting profession as it is these young people who will either become professional accountants or the accountants' future clients. Using an extensive database of 1,794 questionnaires, results show that the impression of the accountant as a corrupt professional is not dominant among GenMe and seem to suggest the existence of a multifaceted perception of accountants' ethics. Specifically, the factors that contribute to influencing GenMe perceptions of accountants' ethics are level of education, having attended an accounting course at high school level, gender, and belonging to the accounting profession. Finally, our study indicates that there is room for improving public perceptions of accountants' ethics through university courses in ethics, continuing education programs, and focused communication strategies by accounting firms and professional bodies.     

The effect of cooperative learning on student perceptions of accounting in the principles courses

This paper describes an experiment that investigates the effect of cooperative learning techniques on introductory accounting students' perceptions of accounting. We administered identical survey instruments measuring students' perceptions of accounting to all accounting principles students at the beginning and end of a semester. Instructors used cooperative learning techniques in one-half of the sections (experimental), and a traditional lecture format in the other sections (control).We compared the pretest and posttest student responses for the experimental and control sections. For Accounting Principles I, 40% of the responses exhibited differences between experimental and control sections that were consistent with a cooperative learning effect. No effect was found for Accounting Principles II. An exploratory factor analysis of Accounting Principles I data showed that the factor “student interest in learning accounting” accounted for most of the differences that were consistent with cooperative learning effects. Also, students in the experimental sections of Accounting Principles I performed marginally better on a common final exam than students in the control sections.Overall, students began their introductory accounting courses with positive perceptions of accounting. Students in sections using cooperative learning techniques were, on average, more likely to maintain those positive perceptions than students in sections using the traditional lecture format.     

Student perceptions of the profession and its effect on decisions to major in accounting

Changes in the business environment have created a perceived need for more creative individuals in the accounting profession. This study asserts that to attract these people, we will have to change existing perceptions of the profession. To test this assertion, we examine the relationship between students' inherent creativity, perceptions of the accounting profession, and decisions to major in accounting. We also examine the extent to which experience in an introductory accounting course changed students' perceptions and major choices. Findings indicate that students hold traditional views of the profession and this deters interest. Business and accounting students tend to be less creative than the general university population. Experience in introductory accounting drew less creative students to the major despite changing perceptions toward more modern views. Overall, the results indicate that perceptions of precision and thoroughness in the profession and the heavy work load in the introductory course discouraged creative personalities from pursuing an accounting major.     

Analysis of the learning context, perceptions of the learning environment and approaches to learning accounting: a longitudinal study

This study investigates student approaches to learning over the 3 years of an undergraduate degree course in accounting. The objective of the study was, first, to identify changes in learning approaches over the course duration. Second, the study examined whether any changes in learning approaches were consistent with changes in the context of learning as well as students' perceptions of the teaching/learning environment. The results show that students made greater use of sophisticated learning approaches over time linked to their more favourable perceptions of the teaching/learning environment as they progressed in their course. However, there were no significant changes in learning approach attributable to the learning context. Implications for accounting educators drawn from the findings are discussed.