Measuring Perceptions of the Ethical Beliefs of Accountants and Non-Accountants

In this study, a survey was conducted with 210 participants recruited from Amazon Mechanical Turk to examine the perceptions that accountants and non-accountants have of (1) their own ethical beliefs and (2) the ethical beliefs of the typical accountant. The results indicate the following. Firstly, the ethical beliefs of accountants are weaker than those of non-accountants. Secondly, compared with non-accountants, accountants perceive that the typical accountant holds weaker ethical beliefs. Thirdly, while accountants perceive that they hold similar ethical beliefs as the typical accountant, non-accountants perceive that they hold stronger ethical beliefs than the typical accountant. Overall, the findings from this study provide insights for accounting practitioners to reflect on and evaluate the effectiveness of the activities that have been undertaken by the profession to strengthen the ethical beliefs of accountants and to improve the ethical reputation of accountants among internal and external stakeholders.