CPA
Vision 2011 and Beyond: Focus on the Horizon, published by the American Institute of
Certified Public Accountants (AICPA), states that emotional skills are extremely
important and interpersonal skills are crucial for success as professional
accountants. During the audit process, auditors may experience emotional
reactions, such as liking or disliking toward client personnel, or anxiety
about components of tasks. Auditors also may also experience different moods
while conducting audits. Research reveals that an important consequence of
auditors experiencing emotions and moods is that these reactions can influence
their decision making and audit judgments.A recently-published research article summarizes the results and practice implications associated with several studies in a stream of research that has examined the role of emotions and moods in auditing. Research illustrates that auditors can experience emotional reactions toward a client (e.g., likability) or an element of a task environment (e.g., anxiety from dealing with certain types of people or about being held accountable) or general moods unrelated to the judgment context (e.g., bad mood related to the weather), which can result in judgment errors.
The research summarized in this paper reveals the potential for auditors’ judgments to be susceptible to emotional reactions toward client personnel and components of a task, as well as general negative and positive moods. Given the fact that auditors’ emotional reactions and moods are pervasive in the audit environment, such effects appear to be somewhat inevitable. There is a potential for these effects to have significant negative consequences. Therefore, a critical first step is to make auditors aware of the potential for emotions and moods to inadvertently impact their judgments, and how the reactions could impact audit effectiveness and efficiency.
For more information, read the 17-page research paper “The Role of Auditors’ Emotions and Moods on Audit Judgment: A Research Summary with Suggested Practice Implications” by Sudip Bhattacharjee (Virginia Tech) and Kimberly K. Moreno (Northeastern University). A manuscript has been accepted for publication in an American Accounting Association (AAA) journal. This preliminary version of the manuscript was posted in the interest of making the information available for distribution and citation as quickly as possible following acceptance.
