IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/bracre/v45y2013i1p10-23.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Towards a conceptual model of whistle-blowing intentions among external auditors

Author

Listed:
  • Alleyne, Philmore
  • Hudaib, Mohammad
  • Pike, Richard

Abstract

Whistle-blowing has received considerable attention in the ethics literature. However, following the collapse of Arthur Andersen in the Enron debacle, whistle-blowing within audit firms has taken on greater importance. Given the profession's requirements to be confidential, independent and to act in the public interest (e.g. Sarbanes–Oxley Act, 2002), there is a need for a model that is specific to the audit profession (e.g. Louwers, Ponemon, & Radtke, 1997), and in particular, that addresses auditors' whistle-blowing intentions. This paper presents a conceptual model on whistle-blowing intentions among external auditors where an auditor's individual factors (attitudes toward whistle-blowing, perceived behavioural control, independence commitment, personal responsibility for reporting and personal cost of reporting) have a direct influence on his or her intentions to whistle-blow, but are moderated by isomorphic factors (perceived organisational support and team norms) and issue-specific factors (perceived moral intensity). Using justice and institutional theories, the proposed model anticipates that whistle-blowing within an audit firm produces both positive and negative consequences to society, the audit firm and the individual whistle-blower. However, where audit firms have adequate formal supporting mechanisms for reporting wrongdoings to internal and external parties, the negative effects and personal costs of reporting will be minimised.

Suggested Citation

  • Alleyne, Philmore & Hudaib, Mohammad & Pike, Richard, 2013. "Towards a conceptual model of whistle-blowing intentions among external auditors," The British Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 45(1), pages 10-23.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:bracre:v:45:y:2013:i:1:p:10-23
    DOI: 10.1016/j.bar.2012.12.003
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0890838912000790
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.bar.2012.12.003?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Sarens, Gerrit & De Beelde, Ignace & Everaert, Patricia, 2009. "Internal audit: A comfort provider to the audit committee," The British Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 41(2), pages 90-106.
    2. Schultz, Jj & Johnson, Da & Morris, D & Dyrnes, S, 1993. "An Investigation Of The Reporting Of Questionable Acts In An International Setting," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31, pages 75-103.
    3. Mary Curtis, 2006. "Are Audit-related Ethical Decisions Dependent upon Mood?," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 68(2), pages 191-209, October.
    4. Ajzen, Icek, 1991. "The theory of planned behavior," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 50(2), pages 179-211, December.
    5. Dennis Hwang & Blair Staley & Ying Te Chen & Jyh-Shan Lan, 2008. "Confucian culture and whistle-blowing by professional accountants: an exploratory study," Managerial Auditing Journal, Emerald Group Publishing, vol. 23(5), pages 504-526, May.
    6. Ad de Jong & Ko de Ruyter & Jos Lemmink, 2005. "Service Climate in Self‐Managing Teams: Mapping the Linkage of Team Member Perceptions and Service Performance Outcomes in a Business‐to‐Business Setting," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 42(8), pages 1593-1620, December.
    7. Jeffrey R. Cohen & Nonna Martinov Bennie, 2006. "The Applicability of a Contingent Factors Model to Accounting Ethics Research," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 68(1), pages 1-18, September.
    8. Brennan, Niamh & Kelly, John, 2007. "A study of whistleblowing among trainee auditors," The British Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 61-87.
    9. Mitchell, Austin & Sikka, Prem, 2004. "Accountability of the accountancy bodies: the peculiarities of a British accountancy body," The British Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 36(4), pages 395-414.
    10. Singhapakdi, Anusorn & Vitell, Scott J. & Kraft, Kenneth L., 1996. "Moral Intensity and Ethical Decision-Making of Marketing Professionals," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 36(3), pages 245-255, July.
    11. Heungsik Park & John Blenkinsopp, 2009. "Whistleblowing as Planned Behavior – A Survey of South Korean Police Officers," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 85(4), pages 545-556, April.
    12. Dart, Eleanor, 2011. "UK investors’ perceptions of auditor independence," The British Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 43(3), pages 173-185.
    13. Prem Sikka, 2008. "Enterprise culture and accountancy firms: new masters of the universe," Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 21(2), pages 268-295, February.
    14. DeAngelo, Linda Elizabeth, 1981. "Auditor independence, `low balling', and disclosure regulation," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 3(2), pages 113-127, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Barrainkua, Itsaso & Espinosa-Pike, Marcela, 2018. "The influence of auditors’ professionalism on ethical judgement: Differences among practitioners and postgraduate students," Revista de Contabilidad - Spanish Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 21(2), pages 176-187.
    2. Mujeeb Saif Mohsen Al-Absy & Ku Nor Izah Ku Ismail & Sitraselvi Chandren, 2019. "Corporate Governance Mechanisms, Whistle-Blowing Policy and Real Earnings Management," International Journal of Financial Research, International Journal of Financial Research, Sciedu Press, vol. 10(6), pages 265-282, October.
    3. Maroun, Warren & van Zijl, Wayne, 2016. "Isomorphism and resistance in implementing IFRS 10 and IFRS 12," The British Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 48(2), pages 220-239.
    4. Shan, Yuan George & Troshani, Indrit & Richardson, Grant, 2015. "An empirical comparison of the effect of XBRL on audit fees in the US and Japan," Journal of Contemporary Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 11(2), pages 89-103.
    5. Alleyne, Philmore & Haniffa, Roszaini & Hudaib, Mohammad, 2019. "Does group cohesion moderate auditors’ whistleblowing intentions?," Journal of International Accounting, Auditing and Taxation, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 69-90.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Hengky Latan & Christian M. Ringle & Charbel Jose Chiappetta Jabbour, 2018. "Whistleblowing Intentions Among Public Accountants in Indonesia: Testing for the Moderation Effects," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 152(2), pages 573-588, October.
    2. Lee, Gladys & Xiao, Xinning, 2018. "Whistleblowing on accounting-related misconduct: A synthesis of the literature," Journal of Accounting Literature, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 22-46.
    3. Derek Dalton & Robin Radtke, 2013. "The Joint Effects of Machiavellianism and Ethical Environment on Whistle-Blowing," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 117(1), pages 153-172, September.
    4. Philmore Alleyne & Mohammad Hudaib & Roszaini Haniffa, 2018. "The Moderating Role of Perceived Organisational Support in Breaking the Silence of Public Accountants," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 147(3), pages 509-527, February.
    5. Alleyne, Philmore & Haniffa, Roszaini & Hudaib, Mohammad, 2019. "Does group cohesion moderate auditors’ whistleblowing intentions?," Journal of International Accounting, Auditing and Taxation, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 69-90.
    6. Hengky Latan & Charbel Jose Chiappetta Jabbour & Ana Beatriz Lopes de Sousa Jabbour, 2019. "Ethical Awareness, Ethical Judgment and Whistleblowing: A Moderated Mediation Analysis," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 155(1), pages 289-304, March.
    7. Eileen Taylor & Mary Curtis, 2010. "An Examination of the Layers of Workplace Influences in Ethical Judgments: Whistleblowing Likelihood and Perseverance in Public Accounting," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 93(1), pages 21-37, April.
    8. Valentine, Sean & Godkin, Lynn, 2019. "Moral intensity, ethical decision making, and whistleblowing intention," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 98(C), pages 277-288.
    9. Syahrul Ahmar Ahmad Author_Email: syahrul.ahmar@johor.uitm.edu.my & Malcolm Smith & Zubaidah Ismail & Rahimah Mohamed Yunos, 2011. "Internal Whistleblowing Intentions: Influence Of Internal Auditors’ Demographic And Individual Factors," Annual Summit on Business and Entrepreneurial Studies (ASBES 2011) Proceeding 2011-051-155, Conference Master Resources.
    10. Ni Made Mega Abdi Utami & Gugus Irianto & Yeney Widya Prihatiningtias, 2020. "Analyzing the effect of financial reward, personal cost and reporting channel on whistleblowing intentions utilizing an experimental study," International Journal of Research in Business and Social Science (2147-4478), Center for the Strategic Studies in Business and Finance, vol. 9(2), pages 125-132, March.
    11. Barbara Culiberg & Katarina Katja Mihelič, 2017. "The Evolution of Whistleblowing Studies: A Critical Review and Research Agenda," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 146(4), pages 787-803, December.
    12. Verschuuren, Pim, 2020. "Whistleblowing determinants and the effectiveness of reporting channels in the international sports sector," Sport Management Review, Elsevier, vol. 23(1), pages 142-154.
    13. Vinson, Jeremy M. & Curtis, Mary B. & Conover, Teresa L. & Chui, Lawrence, 2020. "Ethical relativism in accounting: A cross-cultural examination of the influence of culture and risk taking propensity on ethical decision-making," Journal of International Accounting, Auditing and Taxation, Elsevier, vol. 41(C).
    14. Maroun, Warren, 2015. "Reportable irregularities and audit quality: Insights from South Africa," Accounting forum, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 19-33.
    15. Jana Craft, 2013. "A Review of the Empirical Ethical Decision-Making Literature: 2004–2011," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 117(2), pages 221-259, October.
    16. Jeffrey Cohen & Yuan Ding & Cédric Lesage & Hervé Stolowy, 2010. "Corporate Fraud and Managers’ Behavior: Evidence from the Press," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 95(2), pages 271-315, September.
    17. Lu-Ming Tseng, 2019. "How Implicit Ethics Institutionalization Affects Ethical Selling Intention: The Case of Taiwan’s Life Insurance Salespeople," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 158(3), pages 727-742, September.
    18. Kyoko Fukukawa & Christine Ennew, 2010. "What We Believe Is Not Always What We Do: An Empirical Investigation into Ethically Questionable Behavior in Consumption," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 91(1), pages 49-60, February.
    19. Barnett, Tim & Valentine, Sean, 2004. "Issue contingencies and marketers' recognition of ethical issues, ethical judgments and behavioral intentions," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 57(4), pages 338-346, April.
    20. Tara J. Shawver & William F. Miller, 2017. "Moral Intensity Revisited: Measuring the Benefit of Accounting Ethics Interventions," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 141(3), pages 587-603, March.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:bracre:v:45:y:2013:i:1:p:10-23. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.elsevier.com/the-british-accounting-review .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.