Search results

This paper contributes to risk management research with reference to disclosure of risk specific information within the oil and gas industry. This paper provides empirical evidence regarding voluntary and mandatory disclosure behaviour from both a quantitative and qualitative perspective.

A longitudinal empirical study examines probabilistic reserve quantum reporting of UK companies, over a time-period spanning voluntary and mandatory disclosure. The researchers analyse disclosure behaviour under voluntary and mandatory time spans using a logistical regression approach to measure determinants of risk reporting. Form of regulation is considered as the fundamental driver for disclosure whilst controlling for other relevant variables. Implications for developing international regulation are presented with suggestions for further research.

Mandatory reporting is not seen as a significant influence to disclosure. Degree of risk, quality of audit firms, level of stock exchange and organisational visibility each impact on disclosure. The findings indicate that a mandatory disclosure approach is ineffective, partially explained by mimetic and normative forces and a balancing of agency-related costs and benefits. There is an inverse relationship between level of risk and risk reporting.

Generalisation of the findings is limited due to the specific context of the extractive industry.

The paper seeks to inform the International Accounting Standards Board's (IASB) on-going consideration of risk reporting and also its extractive industries deliberations.

The paper provides original insight into the area of risk management with particular focus on risk specificity and quantitative metrics for risk profiling not previously tested. The paper introduces risk profiling as a variable in risk disclosure.

Individual students have different learning styles, and lecturers can no longer afford to ignore this. Lecturers have a responsibility to accommodate students’ different learning styles by including learning style flexibility in the offered learning opportunities. The purpose of this study is to map a teaching case study against the Herrmann Whole Brain® model to determine whether learning style flexibility has been incorporated in the teaching case study.

A teaching case study was developed and delivered as part of an undergraduate level course at a South African residential university. The case study’s primary intention was to illustrate the practical evaluation of general controls in an information technology environment. The teaching case study was analysed in terms of the Herrmann Whole Brain® model to determine whether learning style flexibility had been accommodated in the learning opportunity.

Based on an analysis of the teaching case study against the Herrmann Whole Brain® model, it is evident that the teaching case study incorporated activities that addressed all four quadrants of the Whole Brain® model. It can therefore be concluded that the learning opportunity incorporated learning style flexibility.

This paper contributes to the literature in accounting education by focusing on learning style flexibility specifically using the Herrmann Whole Brain® model, as it appears that limited examples of the use of this model in accounting education have yet been published. Although this paper discusses the use of an auditing case study, the results may be of interest to lecturers in other subject areas across the academic spectrum.

Individuals learn in different ways, using several learning styles, but lecturers may not always present information and learning experiences that match students’ learning preferences. Mismatches between learning and teaching styles can lead to disappointment with the course of study, personal discouragement and underperformance. The learning styles of 735 undergraduate Accounting students and the teaching styles of 46 lecturers from one United Kingdom and one South African university were empirically surveyed, using the Felder‐Solomon Index of Learning Styles questionnaire to consider the students’ learning styles, and an adaptation of the questionnaire to analyse the lecturers’ teaching styles. The study compared learning and teaching styles between two universities in two different countries and then examined possible matches/mismatches between learning and teaching styles. Little mismatch was found (p‐values smaller than 0.3). Other results are discussed and recommendations are made in relation to understanding and meeting students’ learning needs and the needs of professional bodies.

Student success and attrition, especially in the first year, has received increasing attention both in South Africa and internationally. The purpose of this article is to explore peer tutoring as a possible approach to facilitate first‐year student success in Financial Accounting.

The perspectives of tutors and students attending tutor sessions (tutees) were investigated by means of questionnaires, which were complemented by an analysis of the tutees' performance in the subject compared with their participation in the tutor programme. Two cohorts of students (2008/2009) were included in the study.

The results suggest that the tutees experienced the tutor programme positively and were in favour of similar initiatives in their second year of study. The tutors thought the programme had beneficial consequences for tutees. Regular attendance of tutor sessions seemed to benefit at least some students, even though it is difficult to determine causality. English‐speaking students benefited from attending the tutor sessions.

The results are not generalisable beyond the scope of the particular institution, but provide guidance for other institutions considering a similar intervention.

The implementation of a tutor programme entails investments in terms of both money and time. This paper considers the benefits derived from these investments, specifically in an Accounting and South African context.

This study aims to investigate the effect of mandatory international financial reporting standards (IFRS) adoption on the risk disclosure quality by listed European insurers.

The study used a content analysis of the annual reports and consolidated accounts of 13 insurance companies listed in the European market between 2002 and 2007 based on two regulatory frameworks, Solvency and IFRS.

The results showed a significant effect of the mandatory adoption of IFRS and a clear improvement in the quality of risk disclosure. Moreover, risk disclosure is positively associated with the size of the company.

The authors can consider the relatively limited size of the sample as a limitation of this study. Moreover, the manual content analysis used to be considered subjective.

The findings of this study provide useful insights to professional and regulatory bodies about the consequences of IFRS adoption to enhance transparency and particularly risk disclosure.

The research contributes to the existing literature. First, the authors have shown that companies are improving in the quality of risk disclosure even before 2005. Second, the authors have shown that the year 2005 is distinguished by a marked improvement in disclosure trends, with companies aligning themselves with coercive and mimetic regulatory forces. Third, the authors highlight the significant effect of mandatory IFRS adoption even in highly regulated industries, such as the insurance industry.

This study aims to investigate how and why a new management accounting control (MAC) regime emerged in a previously government-owned energy company with a Soviet past in the context of changing politico-economic dynamics in Ukraine.

Drawing upon data from a case study of a large Ukrainian energy company with a Soviet past that has undergone major transformations in recent years, the authors analyze MAC regime changes in the company from an institutional logics perspective. All primary and secondary data used in this study were collected from 2012 to 2016. Retrospective interviews and extensive use of written materials, including corporate documents and other publicly available data, helped them reconstruct those events, which the authors could not observe personally.

The authors observed that MAC regime changes in the company mirror; overall changes in the political and economic environment and Ukraine’s willingness to become closer to the West. The company seems to follow liberal Western market logics and eliminate those of Soviet heritage. The MAC regime changes seemed to contribute to the company’s survival during challenges caused by the political and economic crises that began in 2014 with the annexation of Crimea and other Ukrainian territories in the East of the country, demonstrating the usefulness of the new MAC regime and overall business logic.

This study adds to the literature on management accounting and control change in emerging economies and extractive industries by highlighting the role of changing institutional logics in shaping a MAC regime. The authors explain why, in some contexts (i.e. Ukraine), organizational actors accept and favor liberal Western market logic.

A particularly significant facet of this study concerns its extension of the role of MAC and the way it is perceived in a new international context in times of significant transformation. The results suggest that MAC regime change may be favorably received if it is based on local values and aspirations.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the usefulness of an educational game to develop soft skills (also known as pervasive skills), from the perspectives of three groups of role-players (student participants, student committee members and employer companies). The game was designed to provide students with the opportunity to develop soft skills and to determine whether students applied the pervasive skills required by the South African Institute of Chartered Accountants.

Action research was conducted according to a parallel convergent mixed-method research design. Both qualitative and quantitative data were gathered using questionnaires and focus group interviews to determine the usefulness of the educational game.

All three groups perceived the educational game to be effective in requiring students to apply the full spectrum of soft/pervasive skills. Although all the pervasive skills were perceived to be present in the game, teamwork, communication (listening and verbal) and time management skills were perceived to be most prominent, while written communication, professionalism and ethical awareness were found to be less prominent. Overall, this game can be recommended as an effective and innovative teaching method that can positively contribute to the pervasive skills development of accounting students.

The need to deliver well-rounded accounting graduates demonstrating core technical and soft skills (or pervasive skills and competencies) calls for new and innovative teaching methods. Accounting educators and programmes are continuously challenged regarding which methods to apply to meet these outcomes and substantiate their usefulness.

The South African government is restructuring tertiary education, and subsidies to universities that do not build and strengthen their research capacity will be severely restricted. Hence, academics must publish more research. This study used a questionnaire to gauge the personal opinions and perceptions of and attitudes towards research held by South African Accounting academics. The questionnaire was based on international debates and discourses on Accounting education and research that suggest factors that might affect research production and consumption, and on informal discussions with colleagues in the discipline. Tertiary institutions can use this constructive information to build a research culture and improve research output among these academics, by changing perceptions where needed and empowering Accounting academics to conduct research. The results indicate that the main limitations to research output are inadequate qualifications and a lack of skills with regard to conducting research (only 10 per cent of the respondents possess a doctoral degree), insufficient time for conducting research, financial factors, a lack of mentorship and departmental support, and difficulty finding research topics. The debate on “teaching versus research” is also ongoing.

In accounting education studies, there is increasing interest in using teaching visual tools and contents. However, research about the pedagogical benefits of visual in education is still limited. This paper aims to contribute to the debate by providing evidence on the extent to which the visual represents a relevant learning preference of accounting students.

The paper adopted the visual, aural, read/write, and kinesthetic questionnaire as a tested means to study the learning preferences of accounting students. The empirical study is based on a survey conducted with undergraduate and postgraduate accounting students.

The results show that visualization appears to be the less-relevant learning preference of students. This result is not in line with the emergent discussion in accounting education literature, which examines how visual tools can improve the presentation of accounting information. This opens the debate about the potential use of visual tools in teaching accounting. Besides, gender and origin of students (national vs international) appeared as relevant factors in explaining a greater visual learning preference.

This paper attempts to contribute to the accounting literature by providing evidence on the extent to which the visual represents the relevant learning preferences of accounting students. In addition, given that most of the literature on students’ learning preferences are based on Anglo-Saxon contexts, the authors provide evidence from a Latin country.

Educators in the accounting discipline are faced with the challenge of finding innovative ways to accommodate the flexible learning styles of Millennial students, using “in classroom/contact time” effectively and decreasing transactional distance between students and educators in large classes. In an attempt to address these challenges, this paper aims to describe the implementation of basic e-learning tools (podcasts, vodcasts and voice-over-PowerPoint) as supplementary and substitutional tools in an undergraduate taxation curriculum. The tools were implemented as part of a student-centred approach to the facilitation of learning, embedded in the Blended Learning Theory. The paper reports on students’ use and experience of various basic e-learning tools, as well as the impact of the use of these tools on student performance.

An action research methodology was followed, and data were collected by way of a voluntary, descriptive student survey and student class lists. A total of 387 students completed the survey.

Students appear to have access to devices and data to use e-learning tools. They perceive these tools as helpful study aids and prefer synchronous, substitutional tools. Use of the tools does not have a significant impact on performance; however, it does appear to have a positive impact on the learning environment and student engagement.

The results of the study may be of benefit to educators and curriculum designers who are responsible for reviewing and updating the content delivery methods of undergraduate taxation curricula in large classes with diverse student populations. These results add to the limited body of knowledge on the implementation of basic e-learning tools in a South African accounting education setting.