» Accounting Research Lectures

 November 11th, Tyler Thomas (University of Wisconsin at Madison), Beckman Hall 401
        Title: "To Give Up or Not to Give Up: The Effect of Contract Frame and Target Difficulty on Effort Provision and Performance"

Tyler Thomas is an Assistant Professor in the Wisconsin School of Business at the University of Wisconsin where he teaches both undergraduate and graduate management accounting courses. His research examines how management accounting information can influence individuals’ judgments, decisions, and motivations. He focuses on how cost accounting, performance measurement, and other accounting-related factors can affect individual motivation to exert effort and make decisions in line with organizational goals. Tyler received his Ph.D. in accounting from Michigan State University and has four years of experience as an auditor for the Washington State Department of Revenue. 

 December 2nd, Jeremy Douthit (University of Arizona), Beckman Hall 401
        Title: "Prior Experience and the Effect of New Controls on the Development of Trust”

Jeremy Douthit is an associate professor at the Dhaliwal-Reidy School of Accountancy at the University of Arizona. His research focuses primarily on examining management accounting issues using experimental methods. Specifically, his research examines performance measurement and evaluation, honesty in managerial reporting, and how interpersonal dynamics affect norm development and performance within the firm. His research has been published in The Accounting Review, Accounting, Organizations and Society, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Journal of Management Accounting Research, The European Accounting Review, and Management Accounting Research.  

February 17th, Terry Shevlin (University of California at Irvine), Beckman 401
        Title: "The Deterrence Effect of Cross-Border Monitoring: Evidence from EDGAR Search Activity by Foreign Tax Authorities"

Professor Terry Shevlin is a Professor of Accounting, at the UCI Paul Merage School of Business. He is a UCI Distinguished Professor and holds a Paul Merage Chair in Business Growth. He earned his PhD from Stanford University in 1986 and joined the faculty at the University of Washington where he worked for 26 years until joining UCI in the summer of 2012. He has served as editor on 3 AAA academic journals: Journal of the American Taxation Association (1996-1999), Senior Editor, The Accounting Review (2002-2005) and Co-editor, Accounting Horizons (2009-2012) and on numerous editorial boards (including the top 4 accounting journals). 

(Cancelled) March 3rd, Jessen Hobson (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign)
        Title: TBA

Jessen L. Hobson is a Professor of Accountancy, the Director of the UIUC-Deloitte Foundation Center for Business Analytics, and the Co-Director of the Gies Behavioral Research Lab at the University of Illinois. He received a Ph.D. from the University of Texas and his B.S. and M.S. degrees in accounting from Brigham Young University. He teaches data analytics. Jessen’s research examines how and why managers over-report their performance, how investors and auditors can detect that deception, and how investors use and misuse information. Jessen’s research is published in top journals, such as The Accounting Review and The Journal of Accounting Research.

March 31st, Baohua Xin (University of Toronto), Beckman 401
        Title: "Does Financial Information Presentation Format Matter? Evidence for Research and Development Expense Reporting"

Baohua Xin is an Associate Professor of Accounting and the PhD Program Coordinator (Accounting) at the Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto. His research areas are information economics and capital markets. His recent work has been focused on the effects of accounting disclosure on firm investment and the trust and trustworthiness among market players, and the consequences of financial reporting discretion and mandatory certification of financial reports. He utilizes both analytical modeling and empirical analysis in his research. Baohua Xin received his PhD in Business Administration from the University of Minnesota in 2008. 

 April 21st, Gary Hecht (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign), Wilkinson Hall Classroom 116   
        Title: "Timing is Everything: Managers' Discretionary Weighting of Multiple Performance Measures"

Gary Hecht is a Professor of Accountancy, Arthur Andersen Faculty Fellow, and the Associate Dean of Professional Education Pathways in the Gies College of Business at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Gary received his Ph.D. from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2005. He was on the faculty at Emory University and University of Wisconsin-Madison before returning to University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2013.

Gary’s primary research and teaching interests lie in Managerial Accounting. As Associate Dean of Professional Education Pathways, Gary helps lead Gies develop and deliver non-degree learning opportunities in business education for working professionals.

October 22nd, Kimberly Mendoza

"Audit Report Letter Grades and Financial Reporting Quality: A Laboratory Market Study"

Kim Mendoza is an Assistant Professor in Accountancy at the University of Illinois – Urbana-Champaign. She obtained her PhD from the University of Washington in 2017. Prior to graduate school, she worked as an auditor at PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP. Her research focuses on both Auditing and Financial Accounting, and she uses primarily experimental methods to investigate her research questions. Her work in Auditing investigates auditing standards, while her work in Financial Accounting investigates the impact of technology on investors. Kim teaches Data Analytics and developed a course in Data Analytics that won the 2021 AAA Innovation in Accounting Education.  

November 5th, Phillip Quinn

“Disclosure Speed: Evidence from Nonpublic SEC Investigations”

Dr. Quinn is a tenured professor at the University of Washington Foster School of Business. An award-winning researcher and teacher, Dr. Quinn has expertise on issues related to executive compensation, insider trading, and corporate governance. His research regularly appears in leading academic journals, the business media, and has been cited in federal securities law enacted by the Securities and Exchange Commission. Dr. Quinn received his Ph.D. from the University of Iowa.

November 12th, Tracy Majors

"Multi-faceted Depletion Effects on Auditor Negotiations: The Importance of a Skeptic or Client Service Natural Disposition and the Client’s Dark Triad Personality."

Tracie is an Assistant Professor of Accounting at University of Southern California. In her research, she employs theories from psychology and economics to delve into the negative effects of facets of auditors’ day-to-day environment on their judgment and decision making. Her research also incorporates individual attributes and proposes interventions to address identified problems. Tracie currently teaches introductory accounting, and also has experience teaching graduate-level auditing. She earned her doctorate at University of Texas at Austin, and has served on the faculty at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Prior to her doctorate, she worked in auditing and transaction services at PricewaterhouseCoopers. 

December 3rd, Kathryn Kadous

"Does Status Equal Substance? The Effects of Specialist Social Status on Auditor Assessments of Complex Estimates"

Kathryn Kadous is the Schaefer Chaired Professor of Accounting and the Director and Associate Dean of the Ph.D. Program at Emory University's Goizueta Business School. Professor Kadous' research focuses on the judgment and decision-making processes of auditors and investors, as well as related methodological issues. She has published over 30 journal articles and several book chapters. Kadous is a prior editor for The Accounting Review and a current associate editor for the Journal of Accounting Research. She has held several positions with the American Accounting Association, including President of the Auditing Section.

February 4th, Adam Presslee, Zoom | 10:00 a.m. to 11:30 a.m.

“The Effect of Functional Diversity and Communication Mode on Virtual Team Creativity”

Adam Presslee (PhD, CPA) is an Associate Professor at the University of Waterloo’s School of Accounting and Finance. Adam’s research aims to advance theory that informs practice regarding the design and implementation of effective management control systems. He applies psychology and economic theory to develop predictions regarding the impact of management control system features on employee behavior, and he uses field studies and experiments to test those predictions. Adam’s research has been published in top-tier journals such as The Accounting Review, Accounting, Organizations and Society, and Journal of Management Accounting Research, and he has won a number of prestigious research and teaching awards, which are a testament to his commitment to accounting research and education. Adam serves on the editorial board for multiple journals and is the Associate Director of the University of Waterloo’s Center for Performance Management Research and Education.

February 17th, Andrew Trotman, Argyros Forum 209A | 10:00 a.m. to 11:30 a.m.

“Experiences of Audit Standard Setters: Audit Quality and the Interactions of Parties Involved in the Financial Reporting Supply Chain”

Andrew Trotman is an Assistant Professor in the Accounting Department at the D’Amore-McKim School of Business, Northeastern University. Andrew received his Ph.D. in 2013 from Bond University (Australia). Andrew’s research focuses on the oversight and improvement of audit quality and corporate governance using experimental and qualitative research methods. He has published in The Accounting Review (TAR), Contemporary Accounting Research (CAR), Accounting, Organizations and Society (AOS), and Auditing: A Journal of Practice & Theory (AJPT). Andrew is an editorial board member at Auditing: A Journal of Practice & Theory and serves as the qualitative method faculty expert for the European Audit Research Network Doctoral Consortium.

February 18th, Leonard Barcellos, Argyros Forum 209C | 10:00 a.m. to 11:30 a.m.

March 4th, Drew Newman via Zoom | TBA

 "Does pay transparency help or hurt? Evidence on employee motivation."

Drew Newman is a professor in the School of Accounting at the Darla Moore School of Business at the University of South Carolina. He joined the Moore School in 2013 after four years as an assistant professor in accounting at the University of Pittsburgh. Newman holds a Ph.D. from Georgia State University and a B.S. and a M.S. in Accounting from the University of Alabama.

April 15th, Jeff Clark, Wilkerson 116 | 1:00 p.m. to 2:30 p.m.

“Do Vesting Requirements Increase the Incentive Effects of Stock Compensation for Rank-and-File Employees?” 

Jeff Clark is a Visiting Assistant Professor in the Kelley School of Business at Indiana University where he teaches undergraduate and graduate management accounting courses. He previously was an Assistant Professor in the Nanyang Business School at Nanyang Technological University. His research investigates the use of accounting information in managerial decision-making settings, with a particular emphasis on incentives, performance evaluation, and performance feedback. Jeff earned his BS and MAcc from Brigham Young University and his Ph.D. from the University of Pittsburgh. He was an auditor with Ernst & Young is a certified public accountant.

Shivaram Rajgopal, October 16th

“Do the Socially Responsible Walk the Talk?”

Shivaram Rajgopal is the Kester and Byrnes Professor of Accounting and Auditing at Columbia Business School. He has also been a faculty member at the Duke University, Emory University and the University of Washington. Professor Rajgopal’s research interests span financial reporting, earnings quality, fraud, executive compensation and corporate culture.  His research is frequently cited in the popular press, including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Bloomberg, Fortune, Forbes, Financial Times, Business Week, and the Economist. He teaches fundamental analysis of financial statements for investors, managers and entrepreneurs and a PhD seminar on accounting regulation. Key awards include 2006 and 2016 American Accounting Association (AAA) Notable Contribution to the Literature award, 2006 and 2016 Graham and Dodd Scroll Prize given by the Financial Analysts Journal, and the 2008, 2012 and 2015 Glen McLaughlin Award for Research in Accounting Ethics.

Victor Mass, October 23rd

“The Effects of Group Incentives and Transparency on Managers’ Strategic Promotion Behavior.”

Victor Maas is Professor of Accounting at the University of Amsterdam. He earned his PhD at the University of Amsterdam in 2007, and worked at Erasmus University Rotterdam before returning to Amsterdam as full professor in 2014. He teaches courses in financial accounting and management accounting in undergraduate, graduate, and executive programs. In his research, he investigates how economic incentives, cognitive processes, and the social environment affect the way in which individuals produce and use accounting information. He has published in journals such as The Accounting Review, Journal of Accounting Research, Accounting Organizations & Society, Behavioral Research in Accounting, European Accounting Review, Management Accounting Research and the Journal of Business Ethics.  Victor is a member of the editorial board of Accounting Organizations & Society, Accounting and Business Research, Behavioral Research in Accounting, Journal of Management Accounting Research, and Management Accounting Research and associate editor of the European Accounting Review. He also coordinates the European Network for Experimental Accounting Research (ENEAR).

Michael Williamson, November 20th 

“Do Performance-Contingent Incentives Help or Hinder Divergent Thinking?“

Michael Williamson is the A.C. Littleton Professor of Accountancy and the Associate Head of the Department of Accountancy, at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He holds a PhD in Accounting from Indiana University. Prior to joining the Geis College of Business, Dr. Williamson was an Associate Professor (Ernest Young Faculty Fellow) at the University of Texas at Austin and Extramural Fellow at Maastricht University. He has published in journals including The Accounting Review, Journal of Accounting Research, Accounting Organizations & Society, Contemporary Accounting Research, Journal of Management Accounting Research, and Accounting Horizons.  Dr. Williamson has served as editor at The Journal of Management Accounting Research, The Accounting Review, and Accounting Organizations & Society and President of the Management Accounting Section of the American Accounting Association.           

Brian Mittendorf, December 4th

“Incentive Provision in Light of the Operational and Financing Roles of Angels.” 

Brian Mittendorf, PhD, is the Fisher Designated Professor of Accounting at The Ohio State University where he also serves as Senior Associate Dean for Staff, Human Resources and Culture. He holds a BBA in Accounting from Baylor University, and a PhD in Accounting from The Ohio State University. Prior to joining the Fisher College of Business, Dr. Mittendorf was an Associate Professor at Yale University's School of Management. Dr. Mittendorf specializes in managerial accounting, nonprofit accounting, and the role of accounting in supply chain management.  Dr. Mittendorf has published many articles in academic journals including The Accounting Review, Journal of Accounting and Economics, Management Science, and the RAND Journal of Economics, and serves as an editor for Production and Operations Management and Journal of Management Accounting Research. He has also been cited in media outlets including the Associated Press, BBC News, Bloomberg, Chronicle of Philanthropy, CNN Money, Marketwatch, NBC News, Newsweek, Nonprofit Times, NPR, Rolling Stone, San Francisco Chronicle, The Guardian, The New Yorker, USA Today, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post. Dr. Mittendorf teaches courses on financial statements for nonprofit and governmental organizations.

Ivo Tafkov, March 5th

“The Effect of Relative Performance Information Level on Team Performance” 

Ivo Tafkov is KPMG / E. Harold Stokes professor in the School of Accountancy at Georgia State University. Tafkov earned his Ph.D. from Emory University, his M.B.A. from Kennesaw State University, and his B.B.A. from Sofia University. Tafkov’s research uses theories from economics and psychology to investigate how management control systems influence decision-making within organizations. His work has been published in The Accounting Review, Contemporary Accounting Research, Accounting, Organizations and Society, and Management Accounting Research.

Eric Chan, March 19th

“Promote Internally or Hire Externally? The Role of Trust, Reciprocity, and Performance Measurement Precision”  

Eric Chan is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Accounting. He received his Ph.D. in Accounting from the University of Pittsburgh and B.S. degrees in Accounting and Finance from the University of Maryland, College Park. Prior to pursuing his Ph.D., he worked as a senior auditor for Ernst &Young in Washington, DC. Professor Chan currently teaches the Fundamentals of Managerial Accounting in the McCombs Business Honors Program. His research focuses on using experimental methods to examine issues related to incentive contracting, performance measurement and evaluation, and managerial decision-making.

Andrew Bird, May 7th

“The Credit Channel of Fiscal Policy Transmission”

Andrew Bird is currently an Assistant Professor of Accounting in the Tepper School of Business at Carnegie Mellon University. He received his Ph.D. and MA in economics from the University of Toronto and a BA in economics from the University of Guelph. Professor Bird currently teaches financial accounting and tax strategy. His research focuses on tax, financial accounting, and banking. His work has been published in top accounting and finance journals, including the Journal of Accounting and Economics, The Accounting Review, Review of Financial Studies, Journal of Financial Economics, Review of Finance and Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis.

Willie Choi, November 14th
“Giving Customers Decision Rights: A Field Study of Pay-What-You-Want Pricing at the Box Office”

Jongwoon (Willie) Choi is an Associate Professor in the Department of Accounting and Information Systems at the Wisconsin School of Business. He previously served on the faculty at the Joseph M. Katz Graduate School of Business (University of Pittsburgh). His research examines the use of accounting information in managerial decision-making, with an emphasis on strategic performance measurement systems, and performance evaluation and reward systems. Willie has received several awards for his teaching and research, including the Pitt Business Teacher of the Year, the Impact on Management Accounting Practice Award, and the Best Early-Career Researcher in Management Accounting Award. Poets and Quants also recognized Willie in its annual list of "40 under 40 Most Outstanding Business Professors." Willie earned his BSBA from Washington University in St. Louis, his MAcc from Ohio State University, and his PhD from Emory University.

Kris Allee, December 5th

"P​roduct Market Competition and Disclosure Framing: Evidence from Earnings Conference Calls​”

Kristian D. Allee, the Doyle Z. Williams Chair in Professional Accounting at the University of Arkansas, graduated from Indiana University (Brigham Young University) with a PhD in Accounting (with BS/MAcc degrees). Kris’ research examines firms’ disclosure policies, textual analysis, and computational linguistics on firm disclosures, the production and use of financial statements by small businesses, cost of equity capital, and corporate tax policies. He has published research in The Accounting Review, Journal of Accounting Research, Contemporary Accounting Research, Review of Accounting Studies, Accounting Organizations and Society, Management Science, and the Journal of Management Accounting Research.

Paul E. Madsen, February 20th

“Externalities of Financial Statement Fraud on the Incoming Accounting Labor Force”

Paul E. Madsen is the Deloitte Foundation Professor in the Fisher School of Accounting at the University of Florida. His research uses large-scale, public, archival data to inform professional debates in which the arguments are often subjective and rooted in anecdotal claims, with an emphasis on debates about accounting regulation and labor markets. His research has been published in The Accounting Review; Accounting, Organizations and Society; Accounting Horizons; the Connecticut Law Review; and Accounting, Economics, and Law. He has bachelors and master’s degrees in finance from the University of Utah and a Ph.D. in accounting from Emory University.

Donnie Young, February 20th

“Ambiguous Sticks and Carrots: The Effect of Contract Framing and Payoff Ambiguity on Employee Effort”

My research focuses on judgment and decision-making of those involved in the financial reporting process. Areas of particular interest include identifying factors that influence the behavior of financial reporting managers and how they deal with estimation uncertainty, understanding how auditors' goals and decision processes influence their evaluation of complex estimates contained within financial reports, and how the format and content financial reports influences investors’ decision making. In my free time, I enjoy spending time with my wife and four children hiking, backpacking, and traveling. I am also a big fan of trivia, Euro board games, and movies. I am originally from Nampa, Idaho.

Thomas Hemmer, August 31st

“Aggregation and Convexity in the Provision of Dynamic Incentives”

Thomas Hemmer is the Houston Endowment of Accounting at Jones GSB, Rice University and is currently an Editor at The Accounting Review and a Guest Editor at Journal of Accounting Research. He has previously been on the faculties of University of Washington, UCLA, University of Chicago, London School of Economics and University of Houston. Thomas Hemmer studies Information economics-based theory with a major focus on measurement and incentive problems in organizations as well as problems pertaining to the use and valuation of employee stock options. His current research focuses on optimal dynamic relative performance evaluation and on the predicted distribution of unmanaged accounting earnings. His research has been published in journals such as The Accounting Review, Journal of Accounting Research, Journal of Accounting and Economics, Review of Accounting Studies, Journal of Labor Economics and Economic Theory. Thomas Hemmer has taught a wide variety of PhD courses on analytical economics-based accounting theory at a large number of institutions across the US, Europe and Asia. He has been an invited speaker and participant at the AAA Doctoral Colloquium in Tahoe City four times and an invited speaker at the FARS and MAS Doctoral Colloquiums as well.

Heba Abdel-Rahim, November 1st

“How Far Would Managers go to "Appear As" Good Stewards? A Re-Examination of Honesty Preferences in Managerial Reporting”

Heba Abdel-Rahim is an Assistant Professor of Accounting at the university of Toledo. She earned her Ph.D. in Accounting from Georgia State University in 2016. She holds a Master of Accountancy from the University of Florida and is a CMA and a Fulbright Alumni. Heba’s experimental research examines the effects of managerial accounting systems and practices (e.g., budgeting, incentives, evaluation, etc.) on behavior and decision-making within the firm. She has two papers published in Accounting, Organizations & Society and Journal of Sustainability. Her research received funding from the IMA, Center for the Economic Analysis of Risk (CEAR), and Kohler International Grants.

Carlos Corona, December 6th

“The coordination role of stress tests in bank risk taking.”

Carlos Corona is an Associate Professor of Accounting at Tepper School of Business. Carlos Corona received his PhD degree in Business Administration (Accounting) from Stanford University. His research interests are accounting theory and information economics. His research articles have been published in the Journal of Accounting and Economics, The Accounting Review, and Review of Financial Studies, among others. His latest research focuses on the effects of dynamic reputational incentives on accounting decisions, and on the interaction between accounting standards and banking regulation. He has taught numerous undergraduate and graduate-level classes in financial and managerial accounting, and in corporate governance. Carlos Corona is an awarded teacher and has been selected three times as a finalist for the George Leland Bach Teaching Award (2012, 2017, and 2018). When Carlos isn’t teaching or absorbed in his research, he spends time with his wife and two furbabies and trying very hard not to be the worst gardener in his neighborhood. 

Stephen Baginski, March 7th

“Do Managers Bias their Forecasts of Future Earnings in Response to their Firm’s Current Earnings Announcement Surprise?”

Stephen P. Baginski is the Herbert E. Miller Chair in Financial Accounting at the University of Georgia’s J.M. Tull School of Accounting.  He received his Ph.D. from the University of Illinois in 1986 and taught previously at a number of schools including Indiana University, Florida State University, Washington University in St. Louis, INSEAD, and Bocconi.  Professor Baginski has published articles relating to management earnings forecasts, language in financial reporting, and other topics in a variety of journals including The Accounting Review, Journal of Accounting Research, Contemporary Accounting Research, The Review of Accounting Studies, and Accounting Organizations and Society.

Douglas E. Stevens, March 14th

“The Effect of Outcome Uncertainty on Budgetary Slack and Risk Sharing: An Experimental Examination “

Douglas E. Stevens is the director of the School of Accountancy at Georgia State University’s J. Mack Robinson College of Business and holds the James & Patricia Copeland Deloitte Chair in Accountancy. His experimental and theoretical research demonstrates how incorporating social norms enhances the theory of the firm, and has appeared in leading academic journals including The Accounting Review; Contemporary Accounting Research; Accounting, Organizations and Society; Experimental Economics; and Journal of Business Ethics. He has recently published a book at Cambridge University Press entitled, “Social Norms and the Theory of the Firm: A Foundational Approach.”

Karl Schumacher, October 20th

“Aggregation fallacy: A mistaken belief about the aggregation of probabilistic information”

Karl Schuhmacher completed his Ph.D. in Management at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland, in 2014. Prior to joining the faculty at Emory in 2016, he was a Visiting Research Scholar at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania. His primary research focus is related to management accounting, activity-based costing, and information aggregation. Karl Schuhmacher's work draws on theories from behavioral economics, cognitive psychology, and sociology.

Jonathan Bonham, November 10th

“A Nonparametric Examination of Measurement, Contracts, and Production in the Face of Moral Hazard”

Jonathan Bonham is an Assistant Professor of Accounting at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. Jonathan studies the effect of accounting rules on the actions taken by managers and employees when their compensation is tied to accounting-based performance measures. His research interests also include relative performance evaluation, the relationship between voluntary and mandatory disclosure, and the properties of accounting systems designed to meet the needs of various users. Bonham earned a PhD in Accounting from Rice University as part of its accounting doctoral program’s inaugural graduating class. He also holds a Master of Accountancy, BS in Accounting, and BA in Economics all from Brigham Young University.

Jordan Bable, April 20th

“How Do Investors React to Corporate Political Spending Disclosure?”

Prior to becoming an accounting academic, Jordan worked in retail investing for a regional bank and later served as an auditor for the U.S. Defense Contract Audit Agency. Now, as an assistant professor at the University of Waterloo in Waterloo, Ontario, he studies how the behaviors of managers, employees, and investors are influenced by different accounting-related stimuli such as internal communications, external disclosures, and compensation schemes. He recently defended his doctoral dissertation at the University of Pittsburgh and was a winner of the 2016 Deloitte Foundation Doctoral Fellowship Award.