Prior archival studies find that firms that voluntarily adopted clawback policies have experienced a reduction in restatements. I experimentally examine this outcome by investigating the influence of two key factors (i.e., executive compensation structure and auditor quality) on financial reporting executives' (hereafter, “executives”) decision-making regarding a proposed restatement that will lead to a clawback of their incentives. I find that executives (i.e., CFOs, controllers, and treasurers) facing a lower quality auditor are less likely to agree with amending prior financial statements when a higher proportion of their pay is incentive-based. However, this tendency is reduced when executives face a higher quality auditor, indicating that higher quality auditors can act as effective monitors. My results identify an ex post unintended consequence of clawback regulation that could at least partially offset the benefits of the ex ante deterrent effects of clawbacks, and that could contribute to findings of less frequent restatements when clawback policies are in place. I discuss potential implications regarding the role of executives during restatement decisions and auditors' risk assessments in a clawback environment. Data Availability: Data are available from the author upon request.

This paper provides evidence that the efficacy of voluntary cybersecurity risk management reporting and independent assurance, in terms of enhancing investment attractiveness, depends on whether a company has disclosed a prior cyberattack. Based on the voluntary disclosure literature, we predict and find that issuing the management component of the AICPA's cybersecurity reporting framework absent assurance is more effective when a company has not (versus has) disclosed a prior cyberattack, as nonprofessional investors are less likely to question the reliability of management's reporting. However, obtaining third party assurance of management's report provides a greater benefit for companies that have (versus have not) disclosed a prior cyberattack, as these companies benefit more from the reliability enhancement of assurance. Finally, we find it may be possible to enhance a company's investment attractiveness by issuing the independent assurance report by itself. Our results have implications for companies' cybersecurity risk management reporting and assurance decisions. Data Availability: Data are available upon request.

We examine whether tone at the top emphasizing firm-level commercial, audit quality, or both goals (balanced) can nonconsciously affect auditors' engagement-level tendency to accept management's estimates, and whether the effects differ if management engages a specialist. This study is motivated by academics' and regulators' increasing attention on firm-level tone at the top and concerns about management bias in audited estimates, especially when the evidence is prepared by management's specialist. We find firm-level goals can be pursued nonconsciously by auditors when performing a complex task. When management's specialist is absent, a balanced approach reduces auditors' tendency to agree with management's estimate compared to a commercial approach; however, it is less effective when management's specialist is present. We find an audit quality approach reduces auditors' tendency to accept management's estimate compared to a commercial approach, regardless of the absence/presence of a specialist. Our results have important implications for regulators and audit firms.

SUMMARY We examine the effects of two critical factors auditors consider when auditing complex estimates, the decision to use a specialist and the relative aggressiveness of management's estimate, on jurors' auditor negligence assessments. Experiment 1 finds jurors view auditors' acceptance of a more aggressive estimate as more justifiable, and are thus less likely to find them negligent, when auditors consult with either internal or external specialists. However, these litigation benefits do not extend to audits of less aggressive estimates. Experiment 2 finds jurors are less likely to find auditors negligent when auditors use an external versus an internal specialist, due to greater perceptions of external specialist independence. We also find auditors accrue similar litigation benefits when an external specialist reviews the internal specialists' work. We conclude that utilizing external specialists, either to directly test complex estimates or to review internal specialists' work, limits auditors' litigation exposure when auditing relatively aggressive estimates. JEL Classifications: M40; M41; M42. Data Availability: Available upon request from the authors.

The external validity of conclusions from behavioral accounting experiments is in part dependent upon the representativeness of the sample compared to the population of interest. Researchers are beginning to leverage the availability of workers via online labor markets, such as Amazon's Mechanical Turk (M-Turk), as proxies for the general population (e.g., investors, jurors, and taxpayers). Using over 200 values-based items from the World Values Survey (WVS), the purpose of the current study is to explore whether U.S. M-Turk workers' values are similar to those of the U.S. population. Results show for the majority of items collected, M-Turk participants' values are significantly different from the WVS participants (e.g., values related to trust, ethics, religious beliefs, and politics). We present select items and themes representing values shown to influence judgments in prior research and discuss how those values may affect inferences of behavioral accounting researchers. Data Availability: Data are available from the authors upon request.