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Purpose -The purpose of this study is to analyze whether whistleblowing is a fact among accounting professionals when there is a serious wrongdoing at the workplace and to investigate the differences between accounting professionals about whistleblowing intention according to demographic variables. This paper reviews whistleblowing behavior in the context of professional accounting in Turkey. This study discusses whistleblowing event and analyzes it by using the scenario technique. Design/methodology/approach -Three whistleblowing scenarios were used and participants were asked to indicate the likelihood that the individual in the scenario would blow the whistle. Participants indicated blowing the whistle action on a seven-point likert-type of scale for the given scenario. Findings -The main hypothesis is the differences between whistleblowing behavior of accounting professionals in relation to such demographic characteristics as working conditions, total tenure, gender, age, membership and number of customers according to the scenario. The findings support that accounting professionals' demographic factors are important to understand the whistleblowing behavior from their perspectives. Whistleblowing is experienced among accounting professionals above the average level for each scenario. There are no differences about accounting professionals' whistleblowing behavior in terms of their demographic characteristics (working circumstances, total tenure, age, membership and number of customers) with the exception of gender and age variables.Research limitations/implications -This study's results come with some limitations. One limitation is the low response rate achieved in the data collection process. Another limitation is that this study is conducted among accounting professionals, so these finding results cannot be generalized to other different professionals in Turkey. Practical implications -The findings of the study may get the board of directors' or managers' attention to the point that they should become aware of the importance of whistleblowing in their organizations to encourage employees to report the wrongdoings internally. Social implications -When employees report these wrongdoings outside the organization, corporate reputation of the company can be damaged. This ethical issue should be solved in the context of the organization. Originality/value -This study aims to make several contributions to the accounting and management literature. First, it extends the recent accounting literature on whistleblowing by examining demographic characteristics. Second, most of the studies use questionnaire to collect the data from the participants, but in this study, the authors used the scenario technique that reflects the whistleblowing behavior tendency in a work environment in order to learn accounting professionals' evaluations of whistleblowing behavior.

In this study, we construct a classificatory scheme of impression management tactics and apply it to a sample of sustainability report and annual report CEO statements issued by large Turkish companies. We find a wide range of impression management tactics applied in both types of CEO statements. However, impression management in sustainability report CEO statements emerges as more limited and uniform, revealing clearer prioritizations of impression management tactics when compared to annual report CEO statements. Sustainability report CEO statements emphasize tactics that allow the company to highlight carefully selected, isolated aspects of their sustainability engagement. At the same time, they rarely employ tactics that are geared towards more systematic (quantitative) performance evaluation. We attribute these differences to the way in which corporate sustainability performance is commonly conceptualized and evaluated, emphasising qualitative performance dimensions rather than the reporting of quantitative performance metrics. This results in the application of a different impression management tactics mix and limits the usefulness of sustainability reports as an accountability mechanism when compared to corporate annual reports. In addition, we provide tentative evidence for the context‐specific nature of impression management, with the choice of impression management tactics reflecting the institutional environment a company is based in.

Due to the increasing sustainability concerns among society and investors, companies share information demonstrating their social and environmental impacts to make an impression in corporate reports. Thus, impression management is used to influence company stakeholders’ perception of their performance through graphs. Graphs presented in corporate reports are powerful impression management tools which communicate performance-related messages to the stakeholders. The purpose of this study is to examine the use of graphs to apply various impression management tactics in economic, social, and environmental disclosures of corporate reports. In this research, the use of graphs as an impression management tool has been determined through the corporate reports of 49 companies selected in the BIST (Borsa Istanbul) Sustainability Index of 2018 and 2019, Turkey. In total, 502 graphs in the reports of the selected companies were examined by descriptive analysis and the findings were statistically tested. According to the results, it was found that companies use both presentational enhancement and obfuscation as impression management tactics in corporate reports. This study helps to fill the research gap in the absence of an empirical study conducted in an emerging economy, Turkey. Additionally, it is the first study that focuses on graphs with impression management tactics that has ever been conducted in Turkey.

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