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- Title
Principles-Based versus Rules-Based Accounting Standards: The Influence of Standard Precision and Audit Committee Strength on Financial Reporting Decisions.
- Authors
Agoglia, Christopher P.; Doupnik, Timothy S.; Tsakumis, George T.
- Abstract
Recent accounting scandals have resulted in regulatory initiatives designed to strengthen audit committee oversight of corporate financial reporting and have led to a concern that U.S. GAAP has become too rules-based. We examine issues related to these initiatives using two experiments. CFOs in our experiments exhibit more agreement and are less likely to report aggressively under a less precise (more principles-based) standard than under a more precise (more rules-based) standard. Our results also indicate that CFOs applying a more precise standard are less likely to report aggressively in the presence of a strong audit committee than a weak audit committee. We find no effect of audit committee strength when the standard is less precise. Finally, we find support for a three-path mediating model examining mechanisms driving the effect of standard precision on aggressive reporting decisions. These results should be of interest to U.S. policymakers as they continue to contemplate a shift to more principles-based accounting standards (e.g., IFRS).
- Subjects
UNITED States; AUDITING of corporations; AUDITING standards; AUDITING; ACCOUNTING standards; ACCOUNTING laws
- Publication
Accounting Review, 2011, Vol 86, Issue 3, p747
- ISSN
0001-4826
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.2308/accr.00000045