The effect of visual illusions on the graphical display of information: Evidence of bias and mitigation: Working paper series--08-05

Graphical displays of business and accounting information are widely used as decision aids. Those who use Excel and other programs with graphics generation capabilities are faced with many options for organizing and displaying information in graphs in a manner that does not result in biased decision making or information extraction. This paper describes four graphs each of which exhibits characteristics associated with a certain known visual illusion. A controlled experiment was carried out to demonstrate the visual illusions resulted in systematically biased decision making. It is also proposed and validated that the bias can be mitigated by including properly formatted gridlines when preparing the graphs. The implication of this research is that that an important addition to the set of generally accepted graph preparation guidelines is to include properly formatted gridlines in graphs. Data Availability: Data are available from the author; however, request for data should specify the intended use

The auditor's evaluation of other information accompanying financial statements: Qualitative expressions of magnitude describing corporate earnings: Working paper series--02-02

A significant portion of the annual reports issued by publicly traded firms contains non-numerical information (i.e., written expressions). AU Section 550 of the professional standards (AICPA, 2000) refers to this type of non-numerical information that accompanies the financial statements as (other information.) AU Section 550.04 clearly indicates that the auditor should read this other information and consider whether such information is materially inconsistent with information, or the manner of its presentation, appearing in the financial statements. This paper determines how the readers of the letter to shareholders that appears in the annual report numerically interpret the qualitative expressions of magnitude used by top management (e.g., how readers would numerically interpret the phrase “a significant increase in earnings”). The numerical interpretations of these qualitative expressions are then used to guide auditors in making the determination of when the use of a qualitative expression may be materially inconsistent with the information that appears in the accompanying financial statements

The Formats Required for Strategic Spatial Planning of Post-modernism in Iraq

There are some cities on the local level are classified as postmodern cities, Therefore, the Iraqi planner must recognize the intellectual, ideological and cultural context and not only to stick to the standards and tools. He /she should have a knowledge of the direction of the community and its requirements as a result of living in the postmodern ideology but still belong to the pre- modernism era. The shift to the strategic planning approach in Iraq as an approved planning approach has requirements that must be met by actors in the planning process in Iraq to match the postmodern phase

Signal words and signal icons in application control and information technology exception messages - Hazard matching and habituation effects: Working paper series--06-05

People often encounter warnings in various life situations. These warnings typically include a variety and combination of signal phrases (e.g., "Deadly") and signal icons (e.g., a skull and cross-bones). Users of information technology (IT) frequently encounter such signal words and icons in "exception messages" that appear on computer screens when the user performs an incorrect action or if a condition could arise that may result in a negative occurrence. For example, in the context of accounting application controls which deal with exposures within specific computer application programs. This paper reports the results of two experiments. The first examines the "arousal strength" associated with various signal words and signal icons that are commonly used in IT exception messages. An elicitation exercise was completed by 316 participants, in which each participant viewed exception messages containing combinations of signal words and signal icons and provided their perception as to the severity of a computer problem communicated by the exception message. The results can be used to achieve "hazard matching," whereby the severity of hazard that is implied by the signal word and icon within the exception message can be matched to the level of the potential hazard faced by the user. The second experiment investigated the factor of habituation and if the negative results of habituation can be overcome through the design of exception messages. A strong habituation effect was found to exist and the effect was also found to be mitigated by altering the signal word and icon combination of an exception message

Assessing students' learning of internal controls: Closing the loop: Working paper series--07-03

This study describes the multifaceted components of an assessment process. The paper explains a novel approach in which accounting advisory council members actively participated in a "fun," hands-on activity to rank-order learning outcomes. Understanding internal controls was the top ranked learning competency identified by the advisory council. With this competency identified, the advisory council exercise was then followed-up by a course modification in the auditing course. An empirical study, consisting of a control group and a treatment group, was then conducted to assess whether students' performance on an internal control essay question now met or exceeded established expectations. Collecting data without acting upon it is a waste of resources. This study shows how important it is to close the loop in identifying improvement opportunities

A Necessary and Sufficient Condition for Solving a Rigid Body Problem

In this paper, the motion of a rigid body about a fixed point under the influence of a Newtonian force field is investigated. The Euler-Poisson equations are used to represent that motion. Three first integrals of these equations are well known. The exact solutions of these equations require, in general, a fourth algebraic first integral. The necessary and sufficient condition for some functions to be a fourth first integral of the governing equations is obtained

On the Motion of a Rigid Body in the Presence of a Gyrostatic Momentum

In this paper, the rotational motion ofa rigid body about a fixed point in the Newtonian force field with a gyrostatic momentum l3 about z- axis is considered. The equations of motion and their first integrals are obtained and have been reduced to a quasilinear autonomous system of two degrees offreedom with one first integral. Poincaré’s small parameter method (Malkin, 1959) is applied to investigate the analytical periodic solutions of the equations of motion of the body with one point fixed. rapidly spinning about one of the principal axes of the ellipsoid of inertia. A geometric interpretation of motion is given by using Euler’s angles (Ismail, 1997a) to describe the orientation ofthe body at any instant of time

Assessing Students Learning Of Internal Controls: Closing The Loop

This study describes the multifaceted components of an assessment process. The paper explains a novel approach in which an advisory council participated in a fun, hands-on activity to rank-order learning outcomes. The top ranked learning competency, as identified by the advisory council, was the need for students to gain a better understanding of internal controls. With this competency identified, the advisory council exercise was then followed-up by a modification in the auditing course. An empirical study, consisting of a control group and a treatment group, was conducted to assess whether performance on an internal control essay question by students now met or exceeded established expectations. The results indicated that students preliminary understanding of internal controls had been enhanced. The accounting faculty further closed the loop by approving a new internal controls course designed to cover, in greater detail, topics such as the COSO internal controls framework, Sarbanes-Oxley requirements, recent PCAOB statements, and real-world cases involving internal control failures

The effect of qualitative expressions of magnitude in the letter to shareholders on investors' perceptions of earnings performance: Working paper series--03-18

Annual reports issued by publicly traded firms are important documents for communicating the financial performance of a company. In addition to the financial statements, annual reports contain non-numerical information (i.e., written expressions). The letter to shareholders is typically the first non-numerical item representing management's communication that a reader comes to in an annual report. The primary content of the letter to shareholders is a series of written expressions used to describe the company's financial situation. We report how readers' perceptions are influenced by one type of written expression often found in the letter to shareholders: Qualitative expressions of magnitude (e.g., "minimal," "moderate" or "sizable") used to describe the results of operations. Top management (e.g., presidents) very often uses qualitative expressions of magnitude in the letter to shareholders to describe the quantitative financial performance of the company found in the accompanying financial statements. Holding the actual percentage change in corporate earnings and other contextual factors constant, we find that the type of expression used in the letter to shareholders does influence readers' perception of financial performance reported in the financial statements. In addition, we find evidence that less sophisticated investors are influenced more by the use of qualitative expressions of magnitude