Effects of alternative sample space representations on the accuracy of auditors' uncertainty judgments

Elicitation of an auditor's uncertainty judgment for an account requires a focus on either possible audit values or possible book value misstatements. These alternative sample space representations are formally equivalent in that they differ by a known constant (i.e. book value). However, findings in the psychological literature suggest that such a framing variable may affect auditors' information processing when uncertainty judgments are elicited. This paper describes an experiment which measured the effects of alternative sample space representations on the accuracy of auditors' uncertainty judgments. In contrast with the psychological literature, significant judgment accuracy differences were not detected. Potential reasons for and implications of this result are discussed.     

Auditor Expertise and the Estimation of Dollar Error in Accounts

A major task that auditors undertake in formulating their audit opinion is to estimate the dollar error that might exist in accounts in light of their evaluation of internal control strengths and weaknesses. The research that has been undertaken to evaluate the quality of auditor performance on this task, however, has produced mixed results. The current study tries to overcome some theoretical limitations and measurement limitations that have undermined prior studies. Forty practising auditors rated their abilities on fourteen characteristics derived from a model of expertise. They then undertook an experiment where they judged the extent of dollar error that might exist in the inventories of a manufacturing company. They based their judgments on working papers provided to them that contained, among other information, an evaluation of the company's internal control system. An estimate of the 'true' dollar error in the inventories was calculated using a program that simulated the company's internal control and accounting system. This estimate was then used to calculate the accuracy of the auditors' judgments. Their ratings on the expertise characteristics were not related to their judgment accuracy. Their ratings were related, however, to their confidence in their judgment accuracy. Auditors who considered themselves more expert at the task were more confident in their judgment accuracy but they were, in fact, no more accurate than auditors who considered themselves to be less expert at the task.     

Strategic Auditor Behavior and Going-Concern Decisions

This paper analyzes a game-theoretic model in which a client can potentially avoid a going-concern opinion and its self-fulfilling prophecy by switching auditors. Incumbent auditors are less willing to express a going-concern opinion the more credible the client's threat of dismissal and the stronger the self-fulfilling prophecy effect. Similarly, the client is more willing to switch auditors the more likely it is that auditors' reporting judgments will differ and the stronger the self-fulfilling prophecy effect. Further, with greater noise in the auditor's forecast of client viability, the auditor tends to express fewer going-concern opinions.     

审计判断中的时近效应和肯定性倾向——基于持续经营能力判断的实验研究

时近效应和肯定性倾向系审计判断偏误中的两种。本文利用信念调整模型,以持续经营能力判断为实验任务,检验了不同的反应模式下我国注册会计师审计判断中的时近效应和SBS反应模式下的肯定性倾向。实验结果表明,在SBS反应模式下,我国注册会计师表现出明显的时近效应,而在EOS反应模式下不显著。同时我国注册会计师对肯定性证据更为敏感,说明我国注册会计师审计判断的职业谨慎性不够。同时,会计师事务所应该采取诸如加强项目复核等措施对审计证据进行综合分析,以减轻审计判断中的时近效应。     

审计判断信心研究:一项实验的证据

行为决策理论认为判断信心是影响判断质量的一个重要因素。本文以内部控制风险判断和持续经营能力判断为实验任务,采用实验方法检验了审计人员经验、努力程度等因素与审计判断信心的关系。研究发现,审计人员的经验、努力程度与审计判断信心存在显著的正向关系,任务困难程度的主观感知与审计判断信心存在显著的负向关系,而男性审计人员判断信心明显高于女性审计人员。     

Are Auditors' Analytical Procedures Judgments Affected by Receiving Management Explanations?

This paper reports the results of a computerised experiment focusing on the impact of management representations, and the timing of those representations, on auditors' performance in completing all stages of an analytical procedures (AP) task. While timing of the management explanation had an initial impact on the AP process, there was no difference in the number of correct auditor responses due to this factor. However, receiving the management explanation did affect the cause selected, with auditors receiving that explanation selecting it significantly more often than those who did not receive that explanation. The findings suggest several areas for potential improvement of the auditors' AP proces.     

An examination of order effects in auditors' inherent risk assessments

While recency effects have been reported in a variety of audit tasks, recent studies suggest that these effects may be mitigated under certain conditions. The importance of investigating order effects in auditors' judgments rests with its potential to impact on the efficiency and effectiveness of audits. Since current studies suggest that recency effects may not impact on all audit situations, it is necessary to identify conditions or variables in the task environment that either induce or mitigate recency.
This study examines the occurrence of order effects in auditors' inherent risk assessments, a task not previously examined. Using a case study administered to 70 auditors, this study found that auditors' judgments were not influenced by the order in which audit evidence was evaluated. Rather, the results suggest that judgments of inherent risk may be biased towards conservatism. This may not be surprising given the negative consequences associated with failing to adequately plan an audit. This may cause auditors to act cautiously and thus mitigate recency effects.     

The effects of trust, client importance, and goal commitment on auditors' acceptance of client-preferred methods

The purpose of this study is to extend our understanding of the factors that impact auditor judgment and decision-making. Specifically, we investigate how two factors, client importance and auditor trust, impact auditors' directional goal commitment and decision-making at the transaction level. We find no impact of client importance on the auditors' goal commitment or acceptance of a client preferred accounting treatment. However, we find that trust in client's management is positively related to the commitment to the goal of supporting the client's preferred method of recognizing revenue. Further, we find that auditors' goal commitment is positively related to their acceptance of a client preferred accounting treatment.     

持续经营审计判断的改进:经营效率证据的引入

本文从持续经营审计判断重要性与经营状况类判断证据研究与应用的现状出发,分析了准则规范的不确定性、研究现状的或缺性及实际应用的小概率性,重申经营状况是持续经营审计判断的重要证据,论说经营效率是衡量企业经营状况的核心指标。利用因子分析法筛选财务指标,运用DEA方法计算经营效率,使用Logistic回归方法分别构建基于现行规范的基本判断模型和引入经营效率的改进判断模型,实证验证了经营效率证据引入的有效性。     

Report format and task complexity: Interaction in risk judgments

This study reports the results of an experiment to examine the effect of report format (graphic, tabular) and task complexity on the accuracy and bias of internal auditors' risk judgments. Accuracy is measured as the ability to discriminate between high and low risk reports, while bias is the propensity to report observing a high risk report, apart from the frequency of high risk reports in the population. Forty-seven experienced internal auditors judged the potential for error in each of 70 hypothetical reports. After controlling for individual differences, the results show a significant interaction between report format and task complexity, for both decision accuracy and bias. Implications are discussed.     

The effect of time pressure on auditor attention to qualitative aspects of misstatements indicative of potential fraudulent financial reporting

Motivated by recent concern regarding the auditor's role in fraud detection, this study predicts that (1) under time pressure auditors' attention will become focused on the dominant task at the expense of attention to the subsidiary task and (2) the task of accumulating documentary evidence regarding frequency of misstatements will dominate the task of attending to qualitative aspects of misstatements. Results from an experiment were consistent with expectations.     

Minority Shareholders and Auditors: A Brief History of a Litigious French Merger

The case of a French merger can be used to better understand the nature of conflicts of interest and cognitive conflicts between accountants, shareholders, lawyers and judges. This is especially the case when exchange ratios are unfairly established. When caught in a situation of asymmetric information, minority shareholders try to obtain more information about the auditors' report through judicial proceedings. The financial knowledge possessed by the judge then becomes a necessary condition for shareholders to be protected.     

Addressing Issues Relating To Going-Gongern Audit Qualifications And Corporate Failure

This study examines the incidence of going-concern audit qualifications and of corporate failure for Australian publicly listed companies over the period 1980-90. The analysis includes a review of annual reports for companies that attracted going-concern qualifications but did not subsequently fail, in order to identify potential indicators of survival. The differences between the indicators noted for failed companies that had their last accounts qualified on the basis of going concern, and those of failed companies not qualified, was also examined. Other issues of interest include a comparison of going-concern qualifications by Big Eight (Six) and other audit firms, and the extent and location of disclosure of going-concern problems in the annual report.     

Cognitive dissonance and resistance to change: the influence of commitment confirmation and feedback on judgment usefulness of accounting systems

This study investigates the effects of commitment, confirmation and feedback on people's judgment about the usefulness of costing systems and, in turn, people's resistance to change. Building on the theory of cognitive dissonance, this study predicts that commitment to a particular course of action will cause people to become insensitive to the potential benefits of the rejected alternative. A laboratory experiment was conducted to examine why people are motivated to resist change and what mechanisms they use to rationalize their judgment. Results from the experiment indicated that people's judgments about the usefulness of costing systems were influenced by their commitment to their favored system. People assessed only a subset of their knowledge to support their desired conclusion. Consequently, committed people refused to change their chosen system even when facing negative feedback. In addition, the results confirmed that people normatively know that their judgment should be objective yet they unconsciously make prejudiced judgments biased toward their committed course of action.     

Effects of Feedback and Task Predictability onTask Learning and Judgment Accuracy

This study examines the effect of different types of feedback on task learning and judgment accuracy across different levels of task predictability. The results of a laboratory study show that outcome feedback, alone, and in combination with task properties feedback, promotes judgment accuracy for both high and medium levels of task predictability. The beneficial impact of outcome feedback resulted from learning effects. Specifically , the outcome feedback improved judgment accuracy because of improved task knowledge and, in contrast to previous psychology research, it did not cause a deterioration in judgment consistency where task predictability was less than perfect. The results suggest that the negative effects of outcome feedback on judgment accuracy found in the psychology literature, where task predictability is less than perfect, may be limited in accounting settings where judges have experience with the task.     

Accelerating the acquisition of knowledge structure to improve performance in internal control reviews

We demonstrated that knowledge structure training is effective in imparting transaction flow and control objective knowledge structures and that knowledge structure mediates the relationship between structure training and performance in internal control reviews. A performance degradation associated with participant-task structure incompatibility arose at the point of situation model building rather than during application of knowledge structure in the judgment task. Higher-knowledge structure participants, but not lower-knowledge structure participants, performed better when their knowledge structures and case structures were compatible.     

Why Press Coverage of a Client Influences the Audit Opinion

In this study I use an experiment to examine why auditors are more likely to issue going–concern opinions when the client has been the subject of negative press coverage prior to the date of the audit opinion. I find no evidence that negative press coverage increases auditors' perceptions of legal liability, as was suggested in the prior literature. I do find, however, that negative press coverage increases auditors' perception of a client's bankruptcy probability and this, in turn, leads auditors to modify the audit opinion. Because the press coverage presented in this study provides no new information, the results suggest that auditors react too strongly to redundant information. This over–reaction can result in inefficient allocation of audit resources and can have deleterious affects on clients. Accordingly, policy makers, auditors and their clients might be interested in how auditors' reliance on redundant information can be reduced.     

The effect of investor sophistication on the influence of nonfinancial performance indicators on investors’ judgments

This paper presents an experiment that examines how enhanced disclosure of nonfinancial performance indicators affects the stock‐price estimates of nonprofessional and professional investors. Participants were provided with a case study containing excerpts from a hypothetical company’s annual report. The experiment was a 2 (nonprofessional and professional) × 3 (positive nonfinancial performance indicators, negative nonfinancial performance indicators, and financial information only) between‐subjects design. Consistent with conservatism, the nonprofessional investors underreacted in their stock‐price estimates to the positive nonfinancial disclosures, compared with professional investors with task‐specific knowledge. The results from this study suggest that the value of enhanced disclosure of this type may not flow equally to all users of financial reports, if conservatism, and lack of task‐specific knowledge, adversely affect their decision‐making.     

Delays in reporting price-sensitive information: The case of going concern

Regulators require firms to disclose all price-sensitive information at the earliest possible date. The going-concern opinion constitutes a fundamental uncertainty for the firm and thus is likely to be of a price-sensitive nature. This paper explores whether going-concern uncertainty disclosures are price sensitive in the London market, and then tests whether managements report such audit report information to investors on a timely basis. We capitalize on a London Stock Exchange regulatory loophole which, in effect, allows financially-distressed firms to choose either to report a forthcoming going-concern at the preliminary results announcement stage, or to delay this crucial information to their annual report release. In line with the regulatory requirements, we expect that firms with more price-sensitive, i.e., more serious, adverse news will disclose their forthcoming going-concern opinion at the earliest stage i.e., in their preliminary announcement, rather than delay to their annual report.     

Accountability Demands and the Auditor's Evidence Search Strategy: The Influence of Reviewer Preferences and the Nature of the Response (Belief vs. Action)

This study examines differences in auditors' search behaviors associated with the preferences of audit management (reviewer preferences) and the nature of the required response (belief versus action) in the context of an accounts receivable collectibility review. I find that auditors facing reviewers who expressed concern about auditors spending time specifically looking for evidence inconsistent with explanations provided by the client (credence preference) examined fewer evidence items and followed a more client-prompted search (i.e., a search for evidence that follows directly from the client's explanation) than those facing reviewers who expressed concern about auditors' ready acceptance of client explanations without adequate justification (skepticism preference) and those facing reviewers who expressed no specific concern (unknown preference). Further, auditors in the action conditions examined fewer evidence items and spent less time per evidence item than those in the judgment conditions. Additional analyses also indicate that auditors who were held accountable to a reviewer with an unknown preference generally responded as if the reviewer maintained a skepticism preference.