FACC/UFRJ, VI Congresso Nacional de Administração e Contabilidade - AdCont 2015

Tamanho da fonte: 
A Graph is Worth a Thousand Words: how internal and external factors influence the accountant’s perception and decision-making regarding numerical information
Ricardo Lopes Cardoso, Rodrigo de Oliveira Leite, André Carlos Busanelli de Aquino

Prédio: UNIGRANRIO
Sala: Sala 7
Data: 2015-10-30 02:00  – 04:00
Última alteração: 2015-10-25

Resumo


Previous research (DAVIS, 1989; VESSEY, 1991) showed that graphical information presented in different types can help (or harm) the perception and decision making of accountants. However, no research compared the different ways of graft presentation with table and text disclosure. This paper makes three contributions. First, it replicates previous research with a larger sample size (295) of professional accountants, instead of a smaller sample size of students. Second, it brings the text as a baseline comparison to test how the different ways of information presentation (line and column graphs, tables, and textual disclosure) can enhance the understandability of information. Third, it brings an internal factor to this process. Overconfidence is a personal trait (MOORE; HEALY, 2008) that harms the decision-making of individuals in financial decisions (HAMMOND et al, 2006). A randomized experiment is presented to the subjects, and it shows that, compared to text, column graph was the one that enhanced the perception and decision-making the most, followed by line graphs. No difference was found between table and textual disclosure. Overconfidence harmed the perception and decision-making, and both genders behaved overconfident. Also the disclosure type (text, table, line graph and column graph) did not affect the overconfidence of individuals, providing evidence that overconfidence is a personal trait. At the end of this paper several research paths are highlighted to further study the effect of internal factors (personal traits) on accountants’ perception and decision-making regarding numerical information presented in a graphical form.

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