IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/euract/v11y2002i4p787-794.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Empirical managerial accounting research: are we just describing management consulting practice?

Author

Listed:
  • Christopher Ittner
  • David Larcker

Abstract

This short commentary responds to several issues raised in Zimmerman (2001). We address Zimmerman's criticisms that managerial accounting studies are purely descriptive, conducted without an underlying theory, and unguided by research hypotheses. We also discuss our views regarding the importance of practice-oriented research for understanding managerial accounting choices and for testing economic and non-economic theories. Finally, we highlight some of the new directions in the finance literature, and their relevance for managerial accounting research.

Suggested Citation

  • Christopher Ittner & David Larcker, 2002. "Empirical managerial accounting research: are we just describing management consulting practice?," European Accounting Review, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 11(4), pages 787-794.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:euract:v:11:y:2002:i:4:p:787-794
    DOI: 10.1080/0963818022000047082
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0963818022000047082
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/0963818022000047082?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ittner, Christopher D. & Larcker, David F., 2001. "Assessing empirical research in managerial accounting: a value-based management perspective," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(1-3), pages 349-410, December.
    2. Christopher D. Ittner & William N. Lanen & David F. Larcker, 2002. "The Association Between Activity‐Based Costing and Manufacturing Performance," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 40(3), pages 711-726, June.
    3. Anderson, Shannon W. & Young, S. Mark, 1999. "The impact of contextual and process factors on the evaluation of activity-based costing systems," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 24(7), pages 525-559, October.
    4. Graham, John R. & Harvey, Campbell R., 2001. "The theory and practice of corporate finance: evidence from the field," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(2-3), pages 187-243, May.
    5. Malmi, Teemu, 1999. "Activity-based costing diffusion across organizations: an exploratory empirical analysis of Finnish firms," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 24(8), pages 649-672, November.
    6. Lambert, Richard A., 2001. "Contracting theory and accounting," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(1-3), pages 3-87, December.
    7. Ittner, CD & Larcker, DF, 1995. "Total quality management and the choice of information and reward systems," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33, pages 1-34.
    8. Edward P. Lazear, 2000. "Economic Imperialism," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 115(1), pages 99-146.
    9. Zimmerman, Jerold L., 2001. "Conjectures regarding empirical managerial accounting research," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(1-3), pages 411-427, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Endenich, Christoph & Trapp, Rouven, 2018. "Signaling effects of scholarly profiles – The editorial teams of North American accounting association journals," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 4-23.
    2. Jana Fibírová, 2008. "The Competitive Advantage of Management Accounting [Konkurenční výhoda manažerského účetnictví]," Český finanční a účetní časopis, Prague University of Economics and Business, vol. 2008(2), pages 78-90.
    3. Nimnual Visedsun & Kanitsorn Terdpaopong, 2021. "The Effects of the Strategy and Goal on Business Performance as Mediated by Management Accounting Systems," Economies, MDPI, vol. 9(4), pages 1-17, October.
    4. Mark C. Dawkins, 2024. "Rethinking the academic accounting research model," FINANCIAL REPORTING, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 2024(1), pages 5-22.
    5. Mary A. Malina & Hanne S.O. Nørreklit & Frank H. Selto, 2011. "Lessons learned: advantages and disadvantages of mixed method research," Qualitative Research in Accounting & Management, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 8(1), pages 59-71, April.
    6. María Luisa Pajuelo Moreno, 2013. "Assessment of the Impact of Business Activity in Sustainability Terms. Empirical Confirmation of Its Determination in Spanish Companies," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 5(6), pages 1-32, May.
    7. Carolyn Stringer, 2007. "Empirical performance management research: observations fromAOSandMAR," Qualitative Research in Accounting & Management, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 4(2), pages 92-114, June.
    8. Collin, Sven-Olof Yrjö & Tagesson, Torbjörn & Andersson, Anette & Cato, Joosefin & Hansson, Karin, 2009. "Explaining the choice of accounting standards in municipal corporations: Positive accounting theory and institutional theory as competitive or concurrent theories," CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACCOUNTING, Elsevier, vol. 20(2), pages 141-174.
    9. Marina Godinho Antunes & Joaquín Texeira Quirós & Maria do Rosáirio Texeira Fernandes Justino, 2018. "Role of Management Control Systems in Quality, Innovation and Organizational Performance in Portugal SMES Companies," International Journal of Innovation and Technology Management (IJITM), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 15(02), pages 1-22, April.
    10. Marco Gatti, 2018. "The Impact of Management Accounting Research: An Analysis of the Past and a Look at the Future," International Journal of Business and Management, Canadian Center of Science and Education, vol. 13(5), pages 1-47, March.
    11. Deryl Northcott & Simon Linacre, 2010. "Producing Spaces for Academic Discourse: The Impact of Research Assessment Exercises and Journal Quality Rankings," Australian Accounting Review, CPA Australia, vol. 20(1), pages 38-54, March.
    12. Manthei, Kathrin & Sliwka, Dirk & Vogelsang, Timo, 2021. "Information Provision, Incentives, and Attention: A Field Experiment on Facilitating and Influencing Managers' Decisions," IZA Discussion Papers 14199, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    13. Rouven Trapp & Christoph Endenich & Andreas Hoffjan, 2014. "Towards Intellectual Monism? An Institutional Perspective on Management Accounting Research," Working Papers 2014-ACF-04, IESEG School of Management.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ittner, Christopher D. & Larcker, David F., 2001. "Assessing empirical research in managerial accounting: a value-based management perspective," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(1-3), pages 349-410, December.
    2. Banker, Rajiv D. & Bardhan, Indranil R. & Chen, Tai-Yuan, 2008. "The role of manufacturing practices in mediating the impact of activity-based costing on plant performance," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 1-19, January.
    3. Maria-Victòria Sánchez-Rebull & Angels Niñerola & Ana-Beatriz Hernández-Lara, 2023. "After 30 Years, What Has Happened to Activity-Based Costing? A Systematic Literature Review," SAGE Open, , vol. 13(2), pages 21582440231, June.
    4. Luft, Joan & Shields, Michael D., 2003. "Mapping management accounting: graphics and guidelines for theory-consistent empirical research," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 28(2-3), pages 169-249.
    5. Sebastian Firk & Torben Schmidt & Michael Wolff, 2019. "Exploring Value‐Based Management Sophistication: The Role of Potential Economic Benefits and Institutional Influence," Contemporary Accounting Research, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 36(1), pages 418-450, March.
    6. Jana Fibírová, 2008. "The Competitive Advantage of Management Accounting [Konkurenční výhoda manažerského účetnictví]," Český finanční a účetní časopis, Prague University of Economics and Business, vol. 2008(2), pages 78-90.
    7. Bouwens, J.F.M.G. & van Lent, L.A.G.M., 2003. "Effort and Selection Effects of Incentive Contracts," Discussion Paper 2003-130, Tilburg University, Center for Economic Research.
    8. Harley E. Ryan & Emery A. Trahan, 2007. "Corporate Financial Control Mechanisms and Firm Performance: The Case of Value‐Based Management Systems," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 34(1‐2), pages 111-138, January.
    9. Askarany, Davood & Yazdifar, Hassan, 2012. "An investigation into the mixed reported adoption rates for ABC: Evidence from Australia, New Zealand and the UK," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(1), pages 430-439.
    10. Zimmerman, Jerold L., 2001. "Conjectures regarding empirical managerial accounting research," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(1-3), pages 411-427, December.
    11. Pérez-Méndez, José Antonio & Machado-Cabezas, Ángel, 2015. "Relationship between management information systems and corporate performance," Revista de Contabilidad - Spanish Accounting Review, Elsevier, vol. 18(1), pages 32-43.
    12. Sophie Hoozée & Falconer Mitchell, 2018. "Who Influences the Design of Management Accounting Systems? An Exploratory Study," Australian Accounting Review, CPA Australia, vol. 28(3), pages 374-390, September.
    13. Ittner, Christopher D. & Larcker, David F. & Randall, Taylor, 2003. "Performance implications of strategic performance measurement in financial services firms," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 28(7-8), pages 715-741.
    14. van Veen-Dirks, Paula, 2010. "Different uses of performance measures: The evaluation versus reward of production managers," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 35(2), pages 141-164, February.
    15. Paolo Perego & Frank Hartmann, 2009. "Aligning Performance Measurement Systems With Strategy: The Case of Environmental Strategy," Abacus, Accounting Foundation, University of Sydney, vol. 45(4), pages 397-428, December.
    16. van Veen-Dirks, Paula, 2005. "Management control and the production environment: A review," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(1), pages 263-272, January.
    17. Roychowdhury, Sugata & Shroff, Nemit & Verdi, Rodrigo S., 2019. "The effects of financial reporting and disclosure on corporate investment: A review," Journal of Accounting and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(2).
    18. Van der Stede, Wim A. & Young, S. Mark & Chen, Clara Xiaoling, 2005. "Assessing the quality of evidence in empirical management accounting research: The case of survey studies," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 30(7-8), pages 655-684.
    19. Merchant, Kenneth A. & Van der Stede, Wim A. & Zheng, Liu, 2003. "Disciplinary constraints on the advancement of knowledge: the case of organizational incentive systems," Accounting, Organizations and Society, Elsevier, vol. 28(2-3), pages 251-286.
    20. Bouwens, J.F.M.G. & van Lent, L.A.G.M., 2003. "Effort and Selection Effects of Incentive Contracts," Other publications TiSEM 46a62de7-d051-4620-93bb-3, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:euract:v:11:y:2002:i:4:p:787-794. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/REAR20 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.