This paper investigates whether cost stickiness occurs in small and medium sized companies using a sample of Italian non-listed and listed firms during the period 1999-2008. Our findings show that cost stickiness emerges only for the total cost of labor and not for selling, general, and...

This paper examines the antecedents of non-financial audit quality in the novel setting of sustainability assurance (SA). We proxy SA quality by a content analysis of the information disclosed in approximately 1,200 publicly available SA statements issued by a panel of G500 global firms in the...

This paper examines conflict minerals disclosure (CMD) as mandated by the Dodd-Frank Act. We rely on a thorough content analysis conducted by the Responsible Sourcing Network on a sample of 122 firms that filed CMDs with the SEC in 2015. We document that firms with long-term oriented incentives,...

We study the incidence of supervisors' evaluation biases in a biannual incentive system in an Italian public administration. Using performance reports for 106 employees over three biannual evaluation periods (2001-2006), we analyze supervisors' intertemporal evaluation biases. We find evidence...

This paper provides a sketch of the most important milestones of behavioral accounting in general and judgment and decision-making (JDM) research in accounting in particular, over the last six decades. In order to understand JDM research in accounting it is important to know how “behavioral”...

In an increasingly resource-constrained and unequal world, luxury brands are normally expected to be more accountable in justifying the value of their products. Despite strong societal drivers for greater sustainability, the majority of luxury labels have traditionally been slow to recognize...

This paper examines the initial impact of a ‘good governance' code for charitable organizations that was promulgated in the Netherlands in 2005. Data are gathered from publicly available annual reports of 138 charities in the post-implementation phase of the code (2005-2008). We first examine...

Carbon reduction programs and corporate emissions reporting have expanded rapidly across firms in response to climate change and global warming. This development is partly driven by institutional demands and partly by value creation considerations. The consequences of these developments for...

This paper examines the economic benefits associated with textual attributes and the external assurance of integrated reporting (IR), an innovative form of corporate disclosure that connects financial and environmental, social and governance (ESG) information in a single report. We investigate...

Payment method choice in takeovers is mainly driven by both asymmetric information between the acquirer and the target and the acquirer’s financial capability. In this paper, we examine whether increased transparency and better access to finance induced by environmental, social, and governance...