پارادایم در تحقیقات حسابداری: مشاهده از شمال امریکا

The highest ranked U.S. business schools value, almost exclusively, publications in academic journals deemed to be “A-level” and high quantities of SSCI citations. But the so-called A-level journals, which typically are said to be five in number or less, publish predominantly empirical tests of economics-based models using large, archival data sets. Motivating researchers to publish papers that are situated only in these journals and that gather high quantities of SSCI citations, which are more likely if the publications are in mainstream topic areas, reduces topic, discipline, and research method diversity. The loss of diversity is costly to the schools themselves, the academy and, indeed, society. The narrow focus of the U.S. business schools provides a great opportunity for business schools in Europe and other parts of the world to take a leadership position in many important research areas. But that opportunity will be lost if those schools try to emulate the U.S. business school model.

The word “paradigm” can evoke different meanings. The Free Dictionary defines paradigm as “a set of assumptions, concepts, values, and practices that constitutes a way of viewing reality for the community that shares them, especially in an intellectual discipline.” In this paper, I focus particularly on the word “values” in this definition. I discuss the kinds of research that are valued by most of the highest ranked U.S. business schools (as well as those that aspire to be highly ranked) and the effects of those values on U.S. accounting researchers’ paradigm choices. The administrators at these top-ranked schools set constraints on what professors at these schools can do if they want to be evaluated favorably. These constraints affect research choices regarding topics studied and the theoretical disciplines, models, and research methods employed. In other words, they affect everything that one can think of when hearing the word “paradigm.” At most of the highest ranked U.S. business schools, the kinds of research that are valued have two distinguishing characteristics: (1) publication in an “A-level” academic journal and (2) a high quantity of SSCI citations.1 In this paper I argue that these values are essentially closing the door on many potentially important research undertakings using paradigms considered outside the norm. They are squeezing out topic, discipline, and research method diversity, at great cost to the schools themselves, the academy and, indeed, society. To illustrate the point, compare the research that is being done, as reflected by counts of SSRN working paper postings, with that being published in the major accounting research journals.2Table 1 provides an indication of what accounting researchers have been working on in recent years. This table illustrates the SSRN postings for some illustrative examples, including some “hot” topics (governance and compensation), some popular financial accounting topics (earnings management and conservatism), and some word indicators of management accounting topics (management accounting, performance measurement, cost allocation, and budgeting).3 These data suggest that researchers are working in all of these areas. More papers are being written in the “hot” areas. The financial and management accounting areas show approximately equal activity.