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Reacting to the calls in the contemporary literature to further examine the relationship between board attributes and firms’ decisions to obtain corporate social responsibility assurance (CSRA) through the use of pioneering techniques, this study aims to analyse the influence of such attributes together with the existence of a corporate social responsibility (CSR) committee on the adoption of CSRA using fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (Fs-QCA).

Fs-QCA was performed on a sample of nonfinancial European companies listed on the STOXX Europe 600 index over the period 2016–2018.

The study findings indicate that the decision to obtain a CSRA report depends on a complex combination of the influence of the CSR committee and certain board attributes, such as size, experience, independence, meeting frequency, gender and CEO separation. These attributes play essential contributing roles and, if suitably combined, stimulate the adoption of CSRA.

The study findings are important for policymakers, professionals, organisations and regulators in forming and modifying the rules and guidelines related to CSR committees and board composition.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study represents the first examination of the impact of board attributes and CSR committees on the adoption of CSRA using Fs-QCA method. It also offers a novel methodological contribution to the board-CSRA literature by combining traditional statistical (logistic regression) and Fs-QCA methods. This study emphasises the benefits of Fs-QCA as an alternative to logistic regression analysis. Through the use of these methods, the research illustrates that Fs-QCA offers more detailed and informative results when compared to those obtained through logistic regression analysis. This finding highlights the potential of Fs-QCA to enhance our understanding of complex phenomena in academic research.

This study aims to provide the intellectual structure of the academic literature on board characteristics and corporate social responsibility disclosure (CSRD) and corporate social responsibility performance (CSRP). To do that, the authors analyse the main theories, data sources and methodologies used by researchers, providing information on methodological bias and research gaps. Beyond that, this study offers a novel picture of the most critical drivers of CSRP/CSRD and offer constructive suggestions to guide future research.

A content analysis was performed on 242 articles extracted from the Web of Science database from 1992 to 2019.

Results indicate that board characteristics have a significant and increasing impact on corporate social responsibility (CSR) literature. The results also revealed that the board practices play a crucial role in managing CSRP/CSRD-related issues. The study also identifies the effect of the critical board characteristics on CSRP, CSRD quantity and CSRD quality. Furthermore, the study findings provide an overarching picture of the patterns and trends of the systematic nexus between board characteristics and CSRP/CSRD quality and quantity.

The study findings help provide an overarching picture of the systematic nexus patterns and trends between board characteristics and CSRP/CSRD quality and quantity. These results draw potential future avenues to bridge the void in the current board–CSR literature by presenting fruitful and indispensable directions for future research (governance mechanisms, new methodologies, variables, countries, etc.). It also suggests multidimensional and in-depth insights for reforming the board of directors’ guidelines.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, minimal attention has been paid to systematising the literature on board and CSR.