Public Accountants, Senior Accounting Students, and Non-Accounting Senior Business Majors: Comparing their Perception of Corporate Ethics and Social Responsibility

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to analyze data collected from public accountants and students to assess differences in their perceived stakeholder and stockholder views. Paired-sample t-tests indicated that both public accountants and senior accounting students had a propensity to support the stakeholder view whereas non-accounting senior business students' perception of the stakeholder view was not significantly different from their perception of the stockholder view. One-way ANOVA results indicated that public accountants' perception of the stakeholder view was significantly higher than that of senior accounting students and both groups had significantly higher perceptions of the stakeholder view than non-accounting senior business students. On the other hand, non-accounting senior business students' perception of the stockholder view was significantly higher than that of both public accountants and senior accounting students. Furthermore, senior accounting students' perception of the stockholder view was significantly higher than that of public accountants.