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Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB) member schools often compare their faculties’ research records to journal lists of their “peer and aspirational” programs. They often survey faculty and administrators’ perceptions of journal quality; number of Social Sciences Citation Index downloads; or “count” the number of faculty publications – but rarely analyze accounting programs’ actual journal quality lists. To examine this issue, we use a survey of national accounting programs. We identify a set of quality-classified journal lists by sampling 38 programs nationwide, varying by mission (e.g., urban or research), degrees granted (e.g., doctoral degrees in accounting), and national ranking (e.g., classified as a Top 75 Research Program) – from which we derive 1,436 data points that classify 359 journals that appear on these 38 programs’ journal lists. We also describe a case study that an accounting program used to revise its old journal list. We also find that while programs generally use generally accepted “bright lines” among the top three categories (A+, A, A−), they tailor their listings from the wide variety of B or C classified journals to create their own sets of acceptable journals in these categories. The study provides guidance and data for accounting programs who wish to develop or revise their own journal lists. While many studies have examined journal rankings, this is the first study to document the use of journal lists by accounting programs with a wide array of missions.

University rankings and metrics have become an increasingly prominent basis of student decisions, generalized university reputation, and the resources university’s attract. We review the history of metrics in higher education and scholarship about the influence of ranking on the position and strategic behavior of universities and students. Most quantitative analyses on this topic estimate the influence of change in university rank on performance. These studies consistently identify a small, short-lived influence of rank shift on selectivity (e.g., one rank position corresponds to ≤1% more student applicants), comparable to ranking effects documented in other domains. This understates the larger system-level impact of metrification on universities, students, and the professions that surround them. We explore one system-level transformation likely influenced by the rise of rankings. Recent years have witnessed the rise of enrollment management and independent educational consultation. We illustrate a plausible pathway from ranking to this transformation: In an effort to improve rankings, universities solicit more applications from students to reduce their acceptance rate. Lower acceptance rates lead to more uncertainty for students about acceptance, leading them to apply to more schools, which decreases the probability that accepted students will attend. This leads to greater uncertainty about enrollment for students and universities and generates demand for new services to manage it. Because these and other system-level transformations are not as cleanly measured as rank position and performance, they have not received the same treatment or modeling attention in higher education scholarship, despite their importance for understanding and influencing education policy.

Much has been analyzed regarding the origins and the impact of rankings and metrics on policies, behaviors, and missions of universities. Surprisingly, little attention has been allocated to describing and analyzing the emergence of metrics as a new action field. This industry, fueled by the “new public management” policy perspectives that operate at the backstage of the contemporary pervasive “regime of excellence,” still remains a black box worth exploring in depth. This paper intends to fill this loophole. It first sets the stage for this new action field by stressing the differences between the policy fields of higher education in the United States and Europe, as a way to understand the specificities of the use of metrics and rankings on both continents. The second part describes the actors of the field, which productive organizations they build, what skills they combine, which products they put on the market, and their shared norms and audiences.

This paper ranks university faculties, accounting doctoral programs, individual behavioral accounting researchers, and the most influential articles based on Google Scholar citations to publications in Advances in Accounting Behavioral Research (AABR). All articles published in AABR in its first 15 volumes are included and four citation metrics are used. The paper identifies the articles, authors, faculties, and doctoral programs that made the greatest contribution to the development of AABR. Such an analysis provides a useful basis for understanding the direction the journal has taken and how it has contributed to the literature (Meyer & Rigsby, 2001). The h-index and m-index for AABR indicates it compares favorably among its peers. Potential doctoral students with an interest in behavioral accounting research, “new” accounting faculty with an interest in behavioral accounting research, current behavioral accounting research faculty, department chairs, deans, and other administrators will find these results informative.

In this chapter, we conduct a metadata analysis of articles published in accounting, business and finance journals ranked by Australian Business Dean Council (ABDC), and benchmarked against the Chartered Association of Business Schools (ABS) ranking, that discuss firm- and country-level greenhouse gas (GHG) emission practices and reporting. Number of publications on GHG research, research methods, number of citations and ratio, across countries and continents are some of the topics we cover. We employ a list of articles on accounting, business and finance journals ranked A* and A in the ABDC journal rankings from 2015 to 2022. The study uses a structured literature review to analyse 74 papers on GHG reporting practices at the firm- and country level. Although this line of enquiry is still nascent and developing, the study found underrepresentation of Africa and the Middle East in GHG literature generally. In addition, majority of the articles examined also concentrate on quantitative methods. Most of the articles on GHG research are A-ranked in the ABDC ranking scheme. It was also found that few studies focus on the countries and companies with the highest emissions. While there has been some progress in interrogating GHG across the globe, there is still much room for further research. A key area of future research is exploring the GHG reporting practices in the African and the Middle Eastern sub-regions. There is also a need to examine countries and companies with high emissions. A further study needs to explore the benefits of other research methods in addition to quantitative methods, as different research methods could yield different insights that would enhance research-based conclusions.

This paper explores the contribution of the AAA Symposium on Ethics Research in Accounting to fostering accounting ethics research. For a 17-year period, the contributors, their schools of affiliation, and their research topics were analyzed to determine the extent of and trends in accounting ethics research. The research rankings of the contributing authors were examined in business ethics journals, top-40 accounting journals, and accounting education journals. Institutional rankings identify supportive places to do accounting ethics research. The impact of significant accounting scandals such as Enron and Madoff was examined and a financial scandal “bump” in paper presentations was found. Authors affiliated with Texas schools had papers following the state requirement of an ethics accounting course. A large amount of ethics education-related research was also presented at the Ethics Symposia. Overall the study results indicate that the Symposium with its AAA affiliation is a high-quality venue for paper presentation.

This study examines possible influences on the level of collaboration in published research by the most productive authors of accounting literature. Understanding the collaboration tendencies of these authors should benefit early-career-stage accounting faculty. Seven factors are examined for the publications of 93 of the most productive accounting authors. These productive authors are found to include fewer coauthors on their publications early in their careers. The number of coauthors increases through their first 16 to 17 years and then decreases through the remainder of their careers. The results also indicate that productive accounting researchers include a greater number of coauthors on more recently published articles and on longer articles. Fewer coauthors are included when a productive author is affiliated with a “top-10” university or on articles published in highly ranked accounting journals. Lastly, the results show that prolific authors seek out coauthorship throughout their careers and usually include one or more coauthors on their publications. Implications from these results and specific suggestions for accounting faculty are discussed.

This paper analyzes citations from the first 20 volumes of Advances in Management Accounting using Google Scholar in April and May, 2013.

This study assesses the success of the first 20 volumes of Advances in Management Accounting using citation analysis. Four citation metrics are used. The four citation metrics are: (1) total citations since year of publication until April and May, 2013, (2) citations per author since year of publication until April and May, 2013, (3) citations per year since year of publication until April and May, 2013, and (4) citations per author per year since year of publication until April and May, 2013.

The top 20 authors for each citation metric, the top 20 faculties for each citation metric, and the top 20 doctoral programs for each citation metric are determined. Furthermore, the top 20 articles are determined using two citation metrics and the H-index for Advances in Management Accounting is computed.

Potential doctoral students, current doctoral students, “new” Ph.D.s with an interest in management accounting, current management accounting faculty, department chairs, deans, other administrators, journal editors, and journal publishers will find these results informative.

The authors present analysis of journal evaluations in creating a customized serials collection specific to veterinary medicine. Readers may apply techniques used for the veterinary medicine library to their own subject specific collections.

A review of research in journal evaluations and collection assessment was conducted with emphasis on veterinary medicine. This chapter provides a detailed critique of research on journal evaluations for academic libraries as well as the authors’ customized approach in creating a subject specific core journal list for a veterinary medicine library.

By utilizing the current research in evaluating library journal collections, librarians can customize their own approach to create core journal lists specific to the academic departments they serve, allowing for a more effective serials collection.

Collection assessment and development differs according to user groups based on local needs. Librarians can develop collection development plans specific to their subject areas by using national standards along with local qualitative and quantitative data.

University administrators are increasingly using a range of metrics to evaluate the “quality” of work being undertaken at their institutions. The unit of analysis for these assessments varies from Department (England), field of research (Australia), and the like, but inevitably the assessment works its way to individual researchers. This poses a major challenge for administrators and even more so for researchers. Shifts in institutional policy to meet the challenges of funding and reputation/esteem of rising in the ranks raise a number of questions concerning the temporality and value of academic labor. Notably, decisions about the worth of academic labor are often well removed from the undertaking of that labor and this separation removes the human side of scholarly work and reduces knowledge production to numerical indicators and the achievement of key performance indicators. In this chapter I draw on shifts in an institution’s policy position and the impact that this has on researchers. Particularly I explore the implications of historically mapping research performance using different metrics than were available at the time and expecting researchers to adopt alternate strategies immediately (irrespective of delays in the publication process). Although I do not doubt that administrator decisions are arguably made in the best interests of advancing the institutions position in the increasingly global academy, the presentism of such strategies is in many ways at odds with the long-term focus of building coherent and sophisticated research programs. Alternate means of understanding the challenges and tensions of administrator strategy has the potential to impact on policy and the development of programs for current and aspiring researchers.