Empirical Accounting Seminars: Elephants in the Room

Attendees of accounting empirical research seminars all too often come to view the conclusions presented in the papers as non-persuasive. This disappointing situation indicates that researchers employ data analysis methodologies which inherently support conclusions they are looking for. Such issues are rarely discussed because many participants have relied on the same methodologies – thus they have firsthand knowledge about the inherent deficiencies. The mantra becomes: “We are all aware of uncomfortable aspects of the methodologies used in our research, so why dwell on it?” Because these potential questions tend to be outside normal and acceptable bounds, I term them “elephants in the room”. Five such cases are delineated to illustrate incontrovertible problems therein. To sum it up, the elephants highlight that the purported substantive contents of most published papers will be taken with a grain of salt for the foreseeable future.