[Back]

P. Inwinkl, R. Quick:
"Assurance on CSR reports: impact on the credibility perceptions of non-financial information by bank directors";
Meditari Accountancy Research, Vol 28 (2020), Issue 5; 833 - 862.

Purpose - This paper aims to clarify whether assurance on non-financial corporate social responsibility
(CSR) reports impacts the perceptions and decisions of banks as capital providers. The authors investigate the
effects of the type of assurance provider and the level of assurance provided on decisions by banks to grant
credit, make their own personal investments or recommend share purchases to their customers. The study
aims to expand the domain of assurance on CSR reports (CSRR) by taking up a call by Cohen and Simnett
(2015), who ask for behavioral research on how non-financial report´s intended users interpret and react to
assurance.
Design/methodology/approach - The paper is based on an experiment case on a fictitious company
with a 2 2þ1 between-subjects design. To overcome concerns regarding external validity and to prove
results in a real-world setting, the authors selected German bank directors as subjects due to the extremely
high relevance of banks to the German economy. The authors investigated the perceptions of 69 bank
directors and analyzed the influence of CSR assurance on their decisions.
Findings - The findings suggest that assurance positively influences confidence in CSRR and that,
consequently, bankers are more likely to make favorable decisions toward the reporting companies, such as
approving applications for credit, investing themselves in the company or recommending the purchase of
shares to their clients. These effects are stronger when an accounting firm provides the assurance and when
the assurance level is reasonable rather than limited.
Research limitations/implications - The arguments presented are, strictly speaking, limited to the
case in the experiment and the views held by the bank directors at the time the authors sent out the
questionnaires. Moreover, the cell sizes are quite small. Nevertheless, the authors were able to find highly
significant results.
Practical implications - The main implication of the paper is that the purchase of CSRR assurance
services has a positive effect on bank directors´ perceptions and decisions. They favor the provision of such
services by accounting firms and they prefer a reasonable assurance level. Thus, it can be concluded that
bank directors perceive quality differences between assurance providers, are able to recognize the difference
between reasonable and limited assurance and that the related information is relevant for their decisions.
©

assurance on non-financial corporate, social responsibility, CSR reports

https://publik.tuwien.ac.at/files/publik_289833.pdf