This dissertation was written as part of the MSc in International Accounting, Auditing
and Financial Management at the International Hellenic University.
The purpose of this thesis is to investigate the association between earnings
management and the impact of gender diversity. More specifically, it refers to the role
of female directors in audit committees and how their presence affects earnings
management.
The issue of female representation in Board of Directors and Audit Committees
compiles a significant issue for all the countries as well as for the countries members of
EU. In the following text there are various different research papers about audit
committees’ characteristics and their effects on earnings quality. In order to examine
earnings quality discretionary accruals were used. Based on prior literature,
hypotheses as support are formulated. After examining a sample of 349 firms from 17
European countries for 2016, we do not find satisfying indication that there is a relation
betwixt gender diversity and accrual- based earnings management. Although most of
the previous literature reports different findings, Sun et al. (2011) also did not manage
to find any association between those two variables although they tried to make more
sensitivity tests as we will also present after our main results. the highest percentage of
relevant previous studies were aimed attention to US firms and other audit committee
characteristics and after the application of mandatory and voluntary quotas about
female representation, there is not much research, consequently this study may
provide some evidence as for their influence in European companies.
Collections
Show Collections