 CEO facial masculinity, fraud, and ESG: Evidence from South KoreaKim, Y. Han (Andy), Junho Park and Hojong Shin Emerging Markets Review, 2022, vol. 53, issue C Abstract: Researchers in finance and accounting find that male CEOs' high facial masculinity (fWHR: facial width-to-height ratio), which is known to be related to aggressiveness to achieve higher social status in the neuroendocrinology literature, shows dual impacts on corporate outcomes. For example, firms led by more masculine-faced CEOs have better financial performance (ROA) but are more likely to have a higher likelihood of financial misreporting. The harnessing of the strong achievement drive of masculine-faced CEOs to minimize potentially adverse corporate outcomes is of primary concern. We hypothesize that a well-designed environmental, social, and governance (ESG) practice could serve this purpose. Using a sample of South Korean public companies from 1998 to 2015, we find supporting evidence that a one-standard-deviation increase in fWHR is associated with a three-fold higher likelihood of corporate fraud and that the association is attenuated for firms with stronger ESG performance that includes voluntarily disclosing sustainability reports, holding less cash, and incentivizing with stock options. Keywords: Facial masculinity; Corporate fraud; Governance; Sustainability (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:ememar:v:53:y:2022:i:c:s1566014122000346 DOI: 10.1016/j.ememar.2022.100917 Access Statistics for this article Emerging Markets Review is currently edited by Jonathan A. Batten More articles in Emerging Markets Review from Elsevier |
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