TFL Vsebine / Revija SIR*IUS

Empirical study of personality traits and professional qualifications as factors of accountants' attitudes toward earnings management

V raziskavi smo preizkusili vpliv izbranih osebnostnih lastnosti in profesionalnih poklicnih kvalifikacij na odnos slovenskih računovodij do prikrojevanja poslovnega izida . Glavni namen raziskave je bil ugotoviti, ali osebnostne lastnosti in profesionalne poklicne kvalifikacije vplivajo na to, kako slovenski računovodje zaznavajo to poklicno in etično problematično poslovno prakso. V raziskavi je sodelovalo 310 računovodij slovenskih podjetij, katerih odgovori so bili zbrani s pomočjo elektronske ankete. Obstoj morebitnih povezav med osebnostnimi lastnostmi, profesionalnimi poklicnimi kvalifikacijami in odnosom do prikrojevanja poslovnega izida smo preverili z regresijsko analizo. Samo dve od opazovanih osebnostnih lastnosti (makiavelizem in dispozicijska sprejemljivost) sta pokazali statistično značilno povezanost z odnosom do prikrojevanja poslovnega izida, medtem ko pri ostalih in posedovanju profesionalnih poklicnih kvalifikacij takšne povezanosti nismo ugotovili. Tako za makiavelizem kot tudi dispozicijsko sprejemljivost je smer povezave enaka. Močnejša makiavelizem in dispozicijska sprejemljivost sta povezana s sprejemljivejšim odnosom do tovrstnega početja, šibkejša makiavelizem in sprejemljivost pa z bolj odklonilnim.

Five selected personality traits and professional occupational qualifications were tested in the study for their impact on Slovenian accountants' attitude toward earnings management. The main objective was to investigate whether personality traits and professional occupational qualifications have any impact on how Slovenian accountants think and feel about this ethically problematic business practice. Responses from 310 chief accounting officers of Slovenian companies were gathered via electronic survey, and regression analysis was performed to test relationships between the observed variables. Only two of the observed personality traits (Machiavellianism and dispositional agreeableness) were found to be statistically significantly related to accountants' attitudes, while the impact of others and professional occupational qualifications was found to be statistically insignificant. For both, Machiavellianism and dispositional agreeableness, the direction of the relationship with accountants' attitudes is the same. The higher the levels of accountants' Machiavellianism and dispositional agreeableness, the more positive their attitude towards the observed earnings management behaviour.