 Auditors' identification with their clients: Effects on audit qualityJan Svanberg and Peter Öhman The British Accounting Review, 2015, vol. 47, issue 4, 395-408 Abstract: Although client familiarity is desirable from the auditor's perspective, identifying with clients threatens auditor objectivity. This study examines the extent to which non-Big 4 auditors identify with clients, the effect of auditor–client identification on auditors' client acquiescence to client-preferred treatment, and, finally, whether the harmful effects of auditor–client identification can be extended to a broader set of reduced audit quality acts. The responses of 141 practicing auditors at non-Big 4 firms in Sweden support our theoretical predictions. We find that auditors tend to identify with their clients, and that an auditor who identifies relatively more with a client is more likely to acquiesce to client-preferred treatment and to commit reduced audit quality acts. While previous research has considered only Big 4 firms, the current findings suggest that the problems with auditor identification with clients also hold for non-Big 4 auditors. Keywords: Auditor objectivity; Client identification; Professional identification; Auditors' client acquiescence; Reduced audit quality acts; Non-Big 4 auditors; Sweden (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:bracre:v:47:y:2015:i:4:p:395-408 DOI: 10.1016/j.bar.2014.08.003 Access Statistics for this article The British Accounting Review is currently edited by Nathan Lael Joseph and Alan Lowe More articles in The British Accounting Review from Elsevier |
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