Investigation of the Frequency and Content Analysis of The Articles Relating to Accounting Professional Ethics in Iran

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

Abstract

Introduction
       The number of published articles is considered as the most important quantitative indicator of the scientific production. Analyzing the publication of scientific papers and books is accounted as the most common way for assessing the quantity of scientific research (Pariad and Malaki, 2008). In each domain of specialized science, the extension of a subject is not expected unless it is researched and investigated. Accounting professional ethics is a significant issue which follows this rule and is not an exception. Professional ethics in accounting maintains a central position, as accounting is one of the most difficult and disciplined professions in the world; accordingly, because of the kind of the services that it provides, it should maintain a specific validity and reliability.
       The consistency of this validity and reliability and its enforcement depends on ideological and operational stability of the members of the profession and on the behavioral and ethical disciplines of it (Accounting Organization Technical Committee, 2006). Undoubtedly, the improvement of research is not achieved without extracting the obtained results and publishing the findings (Talebi, 2002). In order to investigate attempts conducted in Iran in the area of ethics, classification and content analysis of ethical issues is required. In effect, content analysis of scientific productions, subject classification of them and identifying the types of published materials in specialized journals, for fast and easy availability to data, is crucial (Saei et. al, 2015). The aim of the present study is to investigate the number, frequency and content of the published articles in the domain of accounting ethics by various Iranian journals (scientific accounting journals, other accounting journals, and nonaccounting journals) in order to provide comprehensive information in this area and to determine the amount and content of the ethical issues assimilated by Iranian scientific journals in comparison with other accounting and nonaccounting journals.
 
Hypotheses
Given the objectives of the study and considering the number of published articles, the following hypotheses are designed:

The average numbers of ethical articles published by the “scientific research journals”, is less than the average numbers of published ethical articles by other accounting and finance journals.
The average numbers of ethical articles published by the " scientific research journals”, is less than the average numbers of published ethical articles by non-accounting and finance journals.
A significant difference exists among the content of the ethical articles published by different journals.

 
Method
       In order to investigate the content and frequency of the accounting professional ethics in Persian literature, first content analysis was used and three categories of the journals were identified: 1) accounting journals listed as “scientific-research journals” and “scientific–development journals” by The Ministry of Sciences, Research and Technology of Iran; 2) other accounting journals; and 3) non –accounting journals. Then, the number of ethical publications of each journal, since the establishment of the designated journal until the end of the September of 2015, was determined. In this regard, only published articles which had the word "ethics" in their titles were selected as the ethical papers for each selected journal. The main reason is that the title of the paper does clearly show the concept and the direct path of the paper. After determining the frequency of numbers of ethical articles of each journal, content analysis approach was applied to disclose details of the ethical issues of the published articles.
 
Results
        On the basis of the data provided by the content analysis and applying T–test, the first hypothesis is confirmed. Therefore, the average numbers of published articles in the field of accounting ethics by scientific journals is less than the number of published papers in other accounting and finance journals. By the same approach, the second hypothesis is confirmed; that means the average number of published papers in accounting ethics by scientific journals is less than the published papers in non-accounting journals. By using X2, the finding regarding the third hypothesis revealed that the third hypothesis is rejected. That means there is not a significant difference between the content of different journals in different domains of the ethics.
 
Conclusion
       The findings of the present study demonstrate that the number of published accounting professional ethics papers in accounting and non- accounting journals until the end of the September 2015 is 110 articles, which is a small amount with regard to the significance of the issue and compared to the volume of the published papers. This value in accounting and financial journals approved by the Ministry of Science, Research and Technology (22 papers in research and scientific journals and zero in scientific developmental journals) relative to the total number of published articles is 22 papers and equals to 0.00527 and in other accounting and financial journals relative to the total number of published papers is 68 papers and equals to 0.0164. Furthermore, the amount of published articles in journals approved by Ministry of Science, Research and Technology is less than other journals. Also, the content analysis of the papers' titles indicate that in all mentioned issues, especially in subjects such as ethics in management accounting, financial accounting, financial management, and accounting education, more attention is required; however, it does not mean that other subjects should be neglected, as totally there are significant numbers of unpublished papers related to accounting ethics and this issue requires the attention of the academic and professional society to all dimensions of the accounting professional ethics.
 
Keyword: Normative Accounting Ethics, Professional Accounting Ethics, Content Analysis, Articles of Accounting Ethices, Accounting Journals

Keywords

Main Subjects

References

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History

  • Receive Date: 20 June 2016
  • Revise Date: 31 July 2016
  • Accept Date: 10 October 2016

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