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This research provides accounting-ethics authors and administrators with a benchmark for accounting-ethics research. While Bernardi and Bean (2010) considered publications in business-ethics and accounting’s top-40 journals this study considers research in eight accounting-ethics and public-interest journals, as well as, 34 business-ethics journals. We analyzed the contents of our 42 journals for the 25-year period between 1991 through 2015. This research documents the continued growth (Bernardi & Bean, 2007) of accounting-ethics research in both accounting-ethics and business-ethics journals. We provide data on the top-10 ethics authors in each doctoral year group, the top-50 ethics authors over the most recent 10, 20, and 25 years, and a distribution among ethics scholars for these periods. For the 25-year timeframe, our data indicate that only 665 (274) of the 5,125 accounting PhDs/DBAs (13.0% and 5.4% respectively) in Canada and the United States had authored or co-authored one (more than one) ethics article.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to provide a measurement system of knowledge‐based assets for graduate students, researchers and practitioners which can help them enhance their understanding of valuation issues. Design/methodology/approach – Three types of validity are reported to be relevant for the purposes of understanding knowledge‐based assets information systems: criterion validity – establishment of a statistical relationship with a knowledge‐based information system and productivity; content validity – representation of a specified universe of contents in the knowledge‐based information system; construct validity – measurement of knowledge. Findings – A framework is provided that helps explain why measurement is important in deciding characteristics such as information value, cost, reliability, validity, and bias (random and non‐random error) which is germane to the development of an efficient and effective knowledge‐based assets information system. Practical implications – The paper is a very useful source of information for graduate students, researchers and practitioners involved with testing, designing, valuing and/or implementing a knowledge‐based information system. Originality/value – A measurement model is presented that may spark future models that can be implemented, tested and translated into actions in various organizational settings.

The financial reporting practices of modern day organizations operating in a knowledge‐based economy will eventually change as intangible assets increasingly become such organizations' most valuable assets. Financial reports need to be supported by intangible performance metrics, in order to ensure that the reports are rigorously interpreted and applied, and if any issues or problematic practices exist, they may be identified and resolved in a timely fashion. This paper aims to focus on this issue.

This paper provides support for the use of knowledge value‐added (KVA) metrics to assist firms in better understanding, evaluating, and reporting intangible assets, and to provide them with more transparency in their operations. Currently, the general consensus seems to be that before any real progress can be made in converging intangible performance metrics with traditional financial reports, modern day organizations need to more actively depict their intangible assets.

A case study demonstrated how KVA measures support financial ratios of a company as well as providing for a better comparison of one industry with another. Further, from this case study the KVA methodology provided an approach for objectively obtaining information about the performance of knowledge assets as well as a means of benchmarking organizations operating in a knowledge economy.

Future research should empirically test whether an organization's performance and operations is better captured by the added value of intangible measures, such as KVA metrics.

The paper shows that implementing intangible asset measures, along with traditional financial measures may provide a better overall platform that is understandable to managers, creditors, investors, and public institutions.

This article provides a framework of classifying and valuing knowledge‐based assets for possible future presentation along with the historical‐cost basis financial statements. Further, this paper provides a definition and classification for knowledge‐based assets, provides reasons for including knowledge‐based assets with historical‐cost basis financial statements, and provides a three‐way classification system for knowledge‐based assets.

This investigation/report/reflection was motivated largely by the occasion of the first Centre for Social and Environmental Accounting Research (CSEAR) “Summer School” in North America.¹ But its roots reach down as well to other recent reflection/investigation pieces, in particular, Mathews (1997), Gray (2002, 2006), and Deegan and Soltys (2007). The last of these authors note (p. 82) that CSEAR Summer Schools were initiated in Australasia, at least partly as a means to spur interest and activity in social and environmental accounting (SEA) research. So, too, was the first North American CSEAR Summer School.² We believe, therefore, that it is worthwhile to attempt in some way to identify where SEA currently stands as a field of interest within the broader academic accounting domain in Canada and the United States.³ As well, however, we believe this is a meaningful time for integrating our views on the future of our chosen academic sub-discipline with those of Gray (2002), Deegan and Soltys (2007), and others. Thus, as the title suggests, we seek to identify (1) who the SEA researchers in North America are; (2) the degree to which North American–based accounting research journals publish SEA-related research; and (3) where we, the SEA sub-discipline within North America, might be headed. We begin with the who.

The purpose of this paper is to evaluate whether trust and distrust in upper-level managers exert different influences on the budgetary proposals of middle managers. Such proposals involve different levels of managerial effort that impact overall budgetary slack.

This paper is based on a laboratory experiment with 160 business managers.

The results show that the more (less) middle managers trust (distrust) their upper-level managers, the more (the less) effort they commit to budgetary proposals. The authors also find that middle managers with low trust are prone to invest more effort and thus create less budgetary slack than managers with high distrust. The results also show that the introduction of suspicion does not vary this initial choice of effort and budgetary slack.

This paper shows the importance of trust and distrust as informal control systems in organizations. The findings support the importance of extrinsic motivation for enhancing effort and reducing budgetary slack. There are a wide range of exogenous variables that have an effect on the development of trust and distrust.

Practitioners may improve their management control by facilitating trust and preventing distrust in interpersonal relationships because both are informal controls that can reduce and increase, respectively, dysfunctional behaviors in organizations, such as budgetary slack.

This paper is among the first to show the distinct effects of trust and distrust (high and low) in the efforts of middle managers. This study provides a dynamic viewpoint of trust through the introduction of suspicion in a budget negotiation.