2018 Fiscal Year Final Research Report
Professional Skepticism and setting negative/implicit propositions
| Project/Area Number |
16K13401
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| Research Category |
Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research
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| Allocation Type | Multi-year Fund |
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| Research Field |
Accounting
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| Research Institution | Waseda University |
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Principal Investigator |
Toba Yoshihide 早稲田大学, 総合研究機構, 招聘研究員 (90106089)
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| Project Period (FY) |
2016-04-01 – 2019-03-31
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| Keywords | audit skepticism / statement audit / forensic audit / audit proposition / accounting assertion / audit quality / action audit / professional skepticism |
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| Outline of Final Research Achievements |
The research is concerned with seeking the concept of professional skepticism, including an examination of whether or not recognizing negative propositions (negatives) is allowed under a financial statement audit. Audit cognition is basically assertion-oriented. Usually, auditors accept management's assertions as the propositions to be verified: they are usually positive and explicit or implicit.
Auditors may need to recognize negatives, however, when they are aware that material misstatements may be included in the financial statements as a result of unusual or unnatural events (management fraud). Negatives should be restrictively recognized only when they feel serious doubts about the integrity of financial statements. Negatives does heighten the auditors' professional skepticism and drive them to perform severer audit testings. But recognizing negatives contradicts sharply the fundamental structure of a financial statement audit itself: negatives must be implicit.
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| Free Research Field |
corporate accounting, corporate auditing
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| Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements |
財務諸表監査においては、監査人が否定的命題を黙示的に設定することは許されない。これが、言明の監査としての財務諸表監査と非言明の監査(行為の監査)とを峻別する境界線である。財務諸表監査の監査認識における最も本質的な特性であり、これを明確にしたことに本研究成果の学術的意義の1つがある。
監査の認識活動は、肯定的命題の立証に限定されるという制約を本質的に抱えており、それゆえ監査実務的には、どのような構文の監査命題を、いかなる水準の懐疑心で(深度)立証すべきかを、監査人は監査プロセスにおける各段階において弾力的に判断する必要がある。現実に起こった監査の失敗についての分析には、この視点が不可欠である。
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