We interview 24 very experienced auditors about how they audit complex accounting estimates such as fair values and impairments and what problems they experience in the process. We find that auditors overwhelmingly choose to audit the details of management's estimate rather than use other...

We examine recent developments in judgment and decision making (JDM) research to provide insight into how two big ideas in this area can be leveraged as overlapping frameworks to examine and improve auditor judgment. The ideas are (1) that human thinking and reasoning can be characterized by a...

Auditors are more likely to identify misstatements in complex estimates if they recognize problematic patterns among an estimate's underlying assumptions. Rich problem representations aid pattern recognition, but auditors likely have difficulty developing them given auditors' limited...

Auditors frequently use valuation specialists to help them improve the quality of audits of fair values, but problems related to specialists' involvement suggest specialists do not always improve audit quality. I interviewed 28 audit partners and managers with extensive experience using...

Auditors experience significant problems auditing complex accounting estimates, and this increasingly puts financial reporting quality at risk. Based on analyses of the specific errors that auditors commit, we propose that auditors need to be able to think more broadly and incorporate...

Auditors frequently use valuation specialists to help them evaluate fair values, but problems related to specialists' involvement suggest the potential benefits of specialists' involvement are under-realized. I interviewed 28 auditors and 14 valuation specialists to investigate how auditors use...

Critics argue that audit research rarely impacts practice and that challenges associated with synthesizing and interpreting research are contributing factors. We propose that using the Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM) as a meta-theoretical framework can help in understanding the collective...

: Regulators and researchers provide evidence that auditors’ judgment quality is problematic in complex audit tasks. We introduce a framework for improving auditor judgment in these tasks. The framework builds on dual-process theory to recognize that high-quality judgment in complex tasks...

We develop a framework for improving auditor judgment in complex audit tasks. The framework recognizes that high-quality judgment in complex tasks requires that auditors (1) possess the knowledge needed for the task, (2) recognize the need for analytical (versus heuristic) processing, and (3)...

Financial reporting quality can benefit from companies and auditors using artificial intelligence (AI) in complex and subjective financial reporting areas. However, this will only happen if managers incorporate AI-based information into their financial reporting decisions, which the popular...