Relationships between communication apprehension, ambiguity tolerance and learning styles in accounting students

José Luis Arquero, Carmen Fernández-Polvillo, Trevor Hassall and John Joyce

Revista de Contabilidad - Spanish Accounting Review, 2017, vol. 20, issue 1, 13-24

Abstract: The dynamics of the global business environment have led to changes in the skills required by accountants in order to add value for their clients. Consequently, there is a growing pressure on accounting educators to design and implement educational programmes that could contribute to the development of the relevant skills. In such a context, it is possible that some characteristics of students (for example communication apprehension, ambiguity tolerance, or learning styles) could be constraints on both skills development and pedagogical change. Previous studies have reported that accounting students tend to have higher levels of the constraining characteristics than students from other disciplines. However, previous research has not considered the extent to which those characteristics are inter-related or have possible synergistic effects in accounting students. The results of this study, based on a sample of accounting students, indicate that those relationships exist. The patterns of correlations are indicative of the constraints that an accounting educator must overcome to effectively develop certain skills. Implications of the results are discussed.

Keywords: Communication apprehension; Ambiguity tolerance; Learning styles; Skills development; Accounting education; aprensión comunicativa; tolerancia a la ambigüedad; estilos de aprendizaje; desarrollo de capacidades; docencia de la contabilidad (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: A22 I29 M49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:spacre:v:20:y:2017:i:1:p:13-24

DOI: 10.1016/j.rcsar.2015.10.002

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