Religion and Corporate Disclosure Quality

Frederick Dongchuhl Oh and Donglim Shin

Hitotsubashi Journal of Economics, 2020, vol. 61, issue 1, 20-37

Abstract: We examine whether religion influences the quality of corporate disclosure, focusing on the role of social trust. Using country-level data on religion and disclosure quality from 38 countries, we find that general religiosity is negatively related to both voluntary and mandatory corporate disclosure qualities. Moreover, by dividing religiosity into two groups according to the hierarchy of religions, we find that these negative relationships are more pronounced for non-hierarchical religions. Finally, we show that religious heterogeneity is positively associated with both disclosure qualities. Overall, our findings suggest a novel channel ‒ social trust ‒ through which national religiouscharacteris ticsa ffect corporate disclosure quality.

Keywords: corporate disclosure quality; voluntary disclosure; mandatory disclosure; religion; social trust (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: G30 L21 M48 Z12 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hit:hitjec:v:61:y:2020:i:1:p:20-37

DOI: 10.15057/hje.2020002

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