What drives auditor reputation and why does it matter? A scoping review and research agenda

Auditor reputation is central to trust in financial reporting, yet evidence on how reputational capital is built remains fragmented. This study conducts scoping review of 85 empirical articles. The review examines determinants and consequences of auditor reputation, proxies used to operate it, and research designs employed, consolidating knowledge and identifying avenues for research. Findings reveal a markedly unbalanced literature. Research is heavily skewed towards consequences (e.g. market-share, audit-fees, capital-market-outcomes), while evidence on determinants remains limited and fragmented. Measurement relies predominantly on coarse firm-level proxies (e.g. Big4-affiliation, market-share) and event-based negative shocks (e.g. scandals, regulatory sanctions). Empirical designs are largely confined to short-term settings, leaving long-term processes of reputation formation, erosion, and recovery insufficiently understood. The study outlines directions for advancing the field, including more granular and behaviourally grounded proxies (e.g. partner-level track-records, media sentiment) and adoption of mechanism-based research designs linking perceived reputation to observable audit practices. A key frontier concerns the role of technology: as auditing becomes increasingly analytics-and-AI-driven, reputational capital may depend strongly on perceived technological competence and data-security reliability.