We investigate whether the disclosure of a firm’s decision to organize as a benefit corporation (BC) rather than a traditional C corporation (CC) influences investors. We survey 136 investors and 57 MBA students and find that they expect BCs to attain higher future corporate social responsibility (CSR) than CCs even when both have equal CSR ratings. Approximately one third of our sample prefers to invest in BCs when CCs have greater financial returns, indicating a willingness by some investors to sacrifice personal financial gain for social good. Our results suggest that investors weight the information contained in BC disclosures as reliable and value-relevant in their investment decisions. We extend the CSR disclosure literature by indicating how investors weight this new type of CSR information, which may affect how BCs fare as publicly traded companies.
The objectives of this study are to (1) propose a new budgetary control mechanism, previously not investigated in academia, i.e., an undisclosed time budget (UTB) and (2) test whether an UTB could be implemented as a pragmatic solution to decrease the magnitude of auditors' underreporting of chargeable time (URT). Over the past few decades, auditing researchers have relied on survey research to document the causes and negative consequences of URT. However, research has yet to experimentally test solutions to the URT problem. We define, propose, and find evidence that firms could utilize an UTB to reduce URT. In contrast to typical disclosed time budgets (where all parties concerned with a budget know the details), an UTB informs auditors of the existence of a time budget target, but does not disclose the specifics of budgeted task times. We predict and find support to suggest that while UTBs do not reduce auditors' perceptions of URT's moral intensity, UTBs do preventively reduce auditors' ability and perceived need to underreport. That is, a UTB increases self-efficacy (confidence in the appropriateness of the time spent on a task) and removes the external anchor of a disclosed time budget. By removing the external anchor, auditors assume a budget that resembles their actual task time is appropriate, which translates into a reduction in URT magnitude. Finally, our results also allow us to suggest that a UTB mitigates the negative reporting effects of tight time budget pressure.
Similar to other characteristics, narcissism is a personality trait that varies by individuals. While the management literature has examined narcissism, there is limited research of narcissism of professionals in public accounting firms. Using the Narcissistic Personality Inventory (NPI), we assess the level of narcissism in practitioners of public accounting firms by examining differences by gender, age, practice area and position. We also compare our results with a prior study that examined narcissism of accounting majors. Our findings show there are differences between accounting students and accounting professionals for certain traits and gender. We also find there are differences for professionals by age, practice area and position for certain traits. Implications for practice are discussed.
ChatGPT, a language-learning model chatbot, has garnered considerable attention for its ability to respond to users’ questions. Using data from 14 countries and 186 institutions, we compare ChatGPT and student performance for 28,085 questions from accounting assessments and textbook test banks. As of January 2023, ChatGPT provides correct answers for 56.5 percent of questions and partially correct answers for an additional 9.4 percent of questions. When considering point values for questions, students significantly outperform ChatGPT with a 76.7 percent average on assessments compared to 47.5 percent for ChatGPT if no partial credit is awarded and 56.5 percent if partial credit is awarded. Still, ChatGPT performs better than the student average for 15.8 percent of assessments when we include partial credit. We provide evidence of how ChatGPT performs on different question types, accounting topics, class levels, open/closed assessments, and test bank questions. We also discuss implications for accounting education and research.
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