This article is concerned with issues of validity and reliability in field research. It examines the nature of, and threats to validity and reliability in field studies and documents some strategies and tactics that may be employed to counter those threats. At a time when field research is becoming an increasingly important and necessary method for more accounting researchers, it is hoped that an article such as this may provide useful reference for the conduct, communication and evaluation of field research in accounting.

This paper reviews cross-cultural research in management control systems (MCS) appearing in English-language journals over the past 15 years. The objectives are to examine these studies for their convergence or otherwise with respect to the state of our understanding of cultural eects on MCS design, and to analyse their theoretical and methodological strengths and weaknesses to guide future research. The review identi®es four major weaknesses seen to apply collectively to this research: (i) a failure to consider the totality of the cultural domain in theoretical exposition; (ii) a tendency to not consider explicitly the dierential intensity of cultural norms and values across nations; (iii) a tendency to treat culture simplistically both in the form of its representation as a limited set of aggregate dimensions, and in the assumption of a uniformity and unidimensionality of those dimensions; and (iv) an excessive reliance on the value dimensional conceptualization of culture, which has produced a highly restricted conception and focus on culture, and placed critical limits on the extent of understanding derived from the research to date. #

This paper reports an examination of economic incentives motivating listed diversified companies in Australia to voluntarily disclose segment information. The study is based on a sample of 65 listed diversified companies. Support is found for ownership diffusion, the level of minority interest in subsidiaries, firm size and industry membership as factors influencing the voluntary disclosure of segment information. No support is found for leverage or diversification into related versus unrelated industries.

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