On November 14, 2014 the MMPA Program hosted their annual Conference at the Credit Valley Golf Club. This year’s topic was Behavioral Accounting Research and its Impacts on the Accounting Profession.
The 2014 MMPA Conference brings together a group of world class scholars to discuss the extremely important impact and policy implications of behavioral accounting research, and of sustainability accounting standards.
Behavioral accounting research focuses on the relationship between the accounting information system and human behavior. It examines the impact of social, cognitive, and emotional factors on the use of the accounting information and the effect of format and content of accounting information on human behavior, and it sheds light on such questions as: Are investors always rational with respect to their use of accounting information? Why are investors fixated on the format of accounting disclosure even though the same information is disclosed? Does fair value accounting improve the informativeness of financial reporting when investors have limited capability in processing accounting information?
The establishment of Sustainability Accounting Standard Board (SASB) in 2011 represents a major milestone for future accounting reporting. SASB’s mission is to continues the tradition of high-quality disclosure by extending accounting infrastructure to material environmental, social, and governance factors. Sustainability accounting standards are intended as a complement to financial accounting standards, such that financial fundamentals and sustainability fundamentals can be evaluated side by side to provide a complete view of a corporation’s performance. Dr. Park, Director of Education of SASB, will speak about the exciting new sustainability reporting standards and how they will impact future financial reporting.
The esteemed speakers and their specific topics presented are as follows:
Professor Theresa Libby, School of Accounting and Finance, University of Waterloo -“Behavioral Accounting Research and its Implications for Accounting Practice”
Professor Claire Tsai, Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto - “Behavioral Economics, Nudge, and Financial Decisions"
Professor Jeffrey Hales, Scheller College of Business, Georgia Institute of Technology - “Behavioral Accounting Research in Financial Reporting”
His research interests center on accounting standard setting and regulation, individual decision making and behavioral finance, using techniques from applied game theory, experimental economics, and psychology. Dr. Hales has published in The Accounting Review, Journal of Accounting Research, Review of Accounting Studies, Journal of Financial Economics, Journal of Behavioral Finance, and Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes. He currently serves as an Ade Hoc Editor for Contemporary Accounting Research, and is an incoming editor for Accounting Horizon. He also serves on the editorial board of The Accounting Review, Contemporary Accounting Research, Accounting, Organizations and Society, and European Accounting Review. He is an Editor and regular contributor for the Financial Accounting Standards Research Initiative (FASRI) blog and a regular co-host for FASRI's weekly Round Table Discussions.
Dr. Douglas Park, Director of Education, Sustainability Accounting Reporting Standard Board -“Accounting Standards for Sustainability”
Douglas has also been an assistant professor of management at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, School of Business and Management, where he taught Strategy, Organization Theory, and Entrepreneurship and received several citations for teaching excellence. At the Stanford University Continuing Studies Program, he has taught Starting Startups, Mergers and Acquisitions, and Business Law.
He has served as Vice Chair of the American Bar Association’s Governance Research and Education Subcommittee, on the ABA’s Sustainability and Governance Subcommittee, and on the Evaluation Committee of the BlackRock/NACD Corporate Governance Innovation Challenge.
Douglas holds a JD from University of Michigan Law School, a PhD in Business from Stanford Graduate School of Business, and an AB magna cum laude with highest honors in Sociology from Harvard College.
The MMPA Programs thanks all the speakers that attended the event and look forward to another exciting Conference and debate in 2015.