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Communication researchers have observed that students will avoid majors that require the use of certain skills where the individual exhibits a high level of apprehension toward those skills. Historically, accounting has been perceived as requiring more math skills and fewer communication skills than other business majors so accounting has typically attracted students with low math apprehension and high communication (written and oral) apprehension. The current study investigates whether business students' perceptions across business majors regarding the level of mathematics, writing, and oral communication skills required for accounting reflect the recent changes in pedagogy and curriculum content for the accounting major.

The results indicate that the perception of skills required to be an accounting major by students in other business majors (more math and less communication) is different from the perception of accounting majors. On the other hand, accounting majors' perceptions of the skills needed to be in an alternative business major is generally similar to students in the respective major. These observations may lead to the interpretation that accounting majors have gotten the word that professional expectations of accountants involve substantial communication skill while that message has apparently not been shared with students who elect to major in other business fields.

This study investigates university students’ perceptions of (i) an introductory accounting course and (ii) the profession of accountancy. The study examines the extent to which these perceptions change during the students’ first semester of accountancy studies, and whether these perceptions relate to the students’ interest in the field of accounting. To investigate these issues, we survey 231 undergraduate students in their first semester of accounting studies at a large Greek university. In general, the results show that the students’ initial perceptions of the accounting profession are rather traditional and stereotypical, but that these perceptions generally become more “positive” at the end of their first semester after completing an introductory accounting course. Moreover, at the end of the semester, the students perceive the introductory course as being more rewarding and enjoyable than they had originally expected. The study also finds that students who are interested in accounting hold more positive views of the course and the profession (both at the beginning of the semester and at the end) than those who are not interested in accounting. The findings underline the important role of educators in influencing the perceptions and intentions of their students with regard to accounting study and profession.

Prior research that attempts to empirically correlate research activity and effective teaching generates conflicting results. These contradictory findings contribute to the scrutiny that currently threatens to undermine accounting education and to impact funds currently directed toward the support of accounting research. The purpose of this study is to measure the impact of relevant research on students’ perceptions of effective teaching. This two-phase study incorporates both a between-subjects decision-making experiment and a ranking instrument to measure the importance of various faculty attributes of teaching effectiveness. The two factors of interest in this study are whether a hypothetical accounting professor (1) conducts and publishes relevant research and (2) incorporates relevant research into classroom lectures. The results of the first phase of the study experimentally demonstrate that students enrolled in accounting classes perceive the professor who does both (conducts and publishes relevant research and incorporates research into classroom lectures) to be significantly more effective than others. Specifically, the study identifies a statistically significant two-way interaction between the two factors of interest. This suggests that students perceive the professor's research to be a component of teaching effectiveness if, and only if, that research is incorporated into the classroom experience of the student. The second phase of the study finds that students generally rank both of the faculty research attributes lower in importance than other previously identified factors used to describe the professor.

This study investigates perceptions of the work of accountants held by first‐year accounting students as part of a national survey of accounting students. First‐year commerce students from five tertiary institutions were surveyed about their perceptions of the accounting profession as well as their intention to complete a major study of accounting at tertiary level. Influences on the formation of their perceptions formed an important part of the study. The results reported in this paper serve to illustrate that the majority of students surveyed had negative perceptions of accounting. The source of influences on perceptions indicated that perceptions were mainly derived from tertiary education experiences. As perceptions influence choice of major and career choice, the findings have important implications for accounting educators and professional accounting bodies.

Prior accounting education literature documents that stereotypical images abound of the accountant as introverted, systematic, antisocial and boring. Although these stereotypes clash with the skills required of modern professional accountants to be problem solvers who regularly interact with people, the question is whether students wishing to become accountants still have these stereotyped perceptions. The purpose of this article is to investigate the preconceived notions of students in South Africa about accountants and whether these perceptions differ because of gender, home language or ethnical differences. A comparison is also made of the perceptions of school‐leavers and final‐year students to determine whether these perceptions change during students’ formal period of study at universities. This research, which is currently highly relevant, given the shortage of students pursuing careers as accountants, could contribute to the debate surrounding the concerns of the future of the accounting profession and the implications for contemporary accounting education. It was found that students perceive accountants as structured, precise and solitary individuals. However, students considered it to be an interesting profession. Significant differences were found between the perceptions of different ethnic groups. No significant differences were found between the perceptions of male and female students, or between Afrikaans‐ and English‐speaking students.

By drawing on Belief Perseverance Theory (BPT), this study investigates the pre- and post-perceptions of the First Accounting Course (FAC) differentiating between accounting and non-accounting students in a virtual learning setting at a Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) university, and explains why students' perceptions have formed.

Adopting a case study approach, this study employs quantitative (anonymous questionnaires) and qualitative (semi-structured interviews) methods.

Responses from 142 financial accounting students indicate that non-accounting majors generally changed the students' perceptions significantly at the end of the semester, whereas students' accounting counterparts had relatively stable perceptions. This study also finds that a large number of non-accounting students perceived the benefits of taking the FAC and generally have less negative perceptions of the accounting profession, which supports the notion that non-accounting students evaluated discrediting information to reassess non-accounting students pre-established perceptions.

This study has several implications as follows: for the accounting education literature on how FAC assists students in changing students' perceptions through the lens of BPT, for professional accounting bodies to find ways to promote accounting careers for students and for educators to increase students’ desire for accounting study and profession.

The findings from this study are expected to contribute to GCC society by providing clarifications towards increasing students’ desire for accounting studies and professions.

This purpose of this paper is to introduce a new theoretical framework in order to examine similarities and differences between accounting major Malaysian and English students. It concerns attributes and outcomes associated with the accounting profession, and the relationship between students' perceptions and intentions to pursue an accounting career.

A survey research approach has been adopted to investigate students' perceptions regarding the accounting profession. The data for this study are collected via questionnaires completed by Malaysian exchange students visiting a university in England and students of a major university in England. The results of the questionnaire are then quantitatively analyzed.

The results indicate that both groups hold positive perceptions of the accounting profession and there is a significant correlation between students' perceptions and their intention to pursue a career in the profession. The study also identifies that Malaysian and English students hold differing perceptions concerning the accounting profession's attributes and outcomes.

This is one of the first accounting education papers using the work value theory to investigate perceptions regarding the accounting profession by Malaysian students of Chinese ethnicity and compare these perceptions with the perceptions of students of a major university in England of English ethnicity.

We discuss an accounting fair designed to foster a more favorable perception of the accounting profession and to identify accounting career opportunities, thereby increasing students’ interest in the accounting major. The fair is a unique model that provides students with accurate information about the accounting profession, rather than to recruit firm employees. The model can be tailored to meet other objectives of accounting departments, such as, to increase diversity of students selecting the major, to increase the quality of students in the major, or other objectives a department might deem appropriate.

We studied the effects of the fair on students’ perceptions of the accounting profession and interest in the accounting major, using pre- and post-accounting fair surveys. Our statistical results indicate the accounting fair was successful in fostering a more favorable perception of the accounting profession. As a result, students’ interest in the accounting major increased, which is consistent with the actual increase in the number of accounting majors at our institution since implementing the fair. Similarly, by employing a fair similar to ours, the achievement of other departmental objectives should result from fostering a more favorable perception of the accounting profession.

Undergraduate accounting program at Umm Al-Qura University in Saudi Arabia is a unique case. The program includes 147 credit hours of which 28 credit hours are religious courses. This study aims to examine the effect of teaching these religious courses on students’ ethical perceptions and decisions.

A survey was conducted for a sample of accounting students at Umm Al-Qura University. The sample was divided into two groups; the first group includes students who did not study religious courses, while the second group includes students who study religious courses. The questionnaire contained three groups of questions that aimed to explore students’ perceptions of ethics in general, students’ perceptions of business ethics and explored their ethical attitudes regarding some accounting decisions that involve ethical dilemmas. Independent two-sample t-test and multiple regression analysis were used to determine whether the responses of the two groups were significantly different.

The findings of the study revealed that teaching religious courses led to an improvement in students’ perception of business ethics and an improvement in students’ ethical decision-making. However, the results of the independent sample t-test showed that this improvement was not significant. The results of the study also revealed that male students tend to make less ethical decisions than female students.

The findings offer an indication for those responsible for managing the accounting program at Umm Al-Qura University to start developing the program so that some of the general religious courses are replaced with specialized courses in accounting ethics that focus directly on ethical dilemmas faced by the accountant when practicing the accounting profession.

This study contributes to the current literature related to examining the effect of teaching ethics courses on the ethical perception of accounting students by focusing on accounting students in Saudi Arabia as a context that has not been examined before.