Template-type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Author-Name: Anne McGeachin Author-Name: Alan Teixeira Author-Name: Stefano Zambon Title: "The ?Real? Impact Factor: Accounting Research, Practice, and Users: Towards a New Relationship between Academia, Professionals, and Standard Setters in Accounting Abstract: Classification-JEL: Keywords: Note: Pages:5-13 Volume: 2016/1 Year: 2016 Issue:1 File-URL:http://www.francoangeli.it/riviste/Scheda_Rivista.aspx?IDArticolo=57657&Tipo=Articolo PDF File-Format: text/HTML Handle: RePEc:fan:Frfrfr:v:html10.3280/FR2016-001001 Number: 1 X-File-Ref: http://www.francoangeli.it/Riviste/References.ashx?idArticolo=57657 Template-type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Author-Name: Jane Broadbent Title: The "Real" Impact Factor: Reflections on the Impact of the Research Excellence Framework Abstract: This paper is an argument for the importance of academics undertaking some (but not only) research that relates to the practical issues faced by practitioners and policy makers and that is geared to achieving impact. It offers a normative argument informed by my experience as a practitioner and an academic and by my experiences in the assessment of impact as part of the UK Research Excellence Framework (REF) in 2014. The paper introduces the nature of the REF and how it was implemented. It also addresses the implications of the performance measurement of impact of REF for Higher Educational Institutions and the individual academics that work within them. In that respect it recognises that performance measures give extrinsic encouragement to particular behaviours. The paper argues that academics should also be intrinsically driven to research that has impact. In order to achieve impact, the paper suggests that we should not see a gap between academics and practitioners, but should instead see practice and academic endeavour as different but complementary elements of the same profession. We should seek to develop better discourses between academics and practitioners and should not attribute greater importance to the views of either party. Instead we should have an engagement that is open to the generation of disagreement as well as agreement but that nevertheless does not see disagreement as the basis for closing down communication. Classification-JEL: Keywords: Note: Pages:15-28 Volume: 2016/1 Year: 2016 Issue:1 File-URL:http://www.francoangeli.it/riviste/Scheda_Rivista.aspx?IDArticolo=57658&Tipo=Articolo PDF File-Format: text/HTML Handle: RePEc:fan:Frfrfr:v:html10.3280/FR2016-001002 Number: 2 X-File-Ref: http://www.francoangeli.it/Riviste/References.ashx?idArticolo=57658 Template-type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Author-Name: Alberto Quagli Author-Name: Francesco Avallone Author-Name: Paola Ramassa Title: The Real Impact Factor and the Gap between Accounting Research and Practice Abstract: This paper explores the gap between accounting research and practice with two primary objectives. First, it provides a review of the main results obtained by the impressive literature on the topic to get a comprehensive picture of this phenomenon, considering the different perspectives and research methods used so far. This review aims not only at summarizing results, but also at outlining a logical framework that could be useful for both our analysis and future studies on the topic. Against this background, our second objective is to carry out an empirical analysis on scholars? motivations and incentives ? rather neglected by prior literature ? with a particular focus on their relationships with professional associations. Evidence from our survey (with 447 questionnaires completed by EAA members) suggests that there is a hierarchy of objectives informing scholars? motivations and that the first one is to publish on highly ranked journals. In such a context, the positive attitude of academics towards practice can be sometimes in conflict with scholars? expectation about effort, individual result and peers? consideration. In other terms, our study supports the idea that there is a gap between research and practice, together with a risk of an increasingly closed community of scientists. Our results seem in line with studies stating that the reasons for this gap essentially lie in the current evaluation logic driving scholars? incentives. Additionally, evidence on scholars? incentives might be helpful in finding new solutions to bridge the gap and supporting future research sharing the same objective. Classification-JEL: Keywords: Note: Pages:29-57 Volume: 2016/1 Year: 2016 Issue:1 File-URL:http://www.francoangeli.it/riviste/Scheda_Rivista.aspx?IDArticolo=57659&Tipo=Articolo PDF File-Format: text/HTML Handle: RePEc:fan:Frfrfr:v:html10.3280/FR2016-001003 Number: 3 X-File-Ref: http://www.francoangeli.it/Riviste/References.ashx?idArticolo=57659 Template-type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Author-Name: Andrew Higson Author-Name: Rasha Kassem Title: Accounting Research: Relevance Lost Abstract: For research to have an impact, it has to exist in the first place. Moves in the UK to link University funding to research activity have reinforced the importance of research to academia - however, this may also have had adverse consequences. It is now very difficult for qualified accountants to obtain teaching and research positions at UK universities because of the lack of a research background. Institutional pressures on those conducting research may also have resulted in dysfunctional behaviour regarding the nature of the work conducted and the output. In the 1960s there was an attempt to make accounting research more "scientific", however, this seems to resulted in the emphasis on research methodology rather than the importance of making a contribution to knowledge. The lack of emphasis on the reliability (the reproducibility of the results) and validity (whether you are testing what you think you are testing) of statistical findings merely appears to have resulted in the application of pseudoscience to accounting research. All these factors appear to have combined to bring into question the relevance of the accounting research produced. Classification-JEL: Keywords: Note: Pages:59-76 Volume: 2016/1 Year: 2016 Issue:1 File-URL:http://www.francoangeli.it/riviste/Scheda_Rivista.aspx?IDArticolo=57660&Tipo=Articolo PDF File-Format: text/HTML Handle: RePEc:fan:Frfrfr:v:html10.3280/FR2016-001004 Number: 4 X-File-Ref: http://www.francoangeli.it/Riviste/References.ashx?idArticolo=57660 Template-type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Author-Name: Michele Pizzo Author-Name: Nicola Moscariello Author-Name: Claudio Teodori Author-Name: Monica Veneziani Author-Name: Laura Rocca Author-Name: Alberto Quagli Author-Name: Elisa Roncagliolo Title: Who Influences Whom? An Exploratory Analysis of the Interrelations between Accounting Research and the IASB?s Standard Setting Activity Abstract: This study investigates the interrelations between accounting research and the IASB activity. Prior research shows a significant gap between academia, the standard setters and the accounting profession and underlines the failure of academic papers to contribute to accounting practice. Although we find some evidence of the intention of the IASB to fill the gap between accounting theory and practice, our analysis confirms the existence of a significant distance between financial accounting research and the IFRSs. The IASB ?due process? definitely influences the academic activity, but the accounting literature does not seem to represent a cornerstone for the IFRSs. Particularly, during the ?due process? steps that precede the P.I.R. phase, the IASB only quotes few papers. With the P.I.R. process, the number of research papers analysed by the IASB significantly increases, but it is not yet clear how this ex-post activity might really influence the IFRSs statements. Finally, we find that the traditional academic ranking systems are not a key factor driving the IASB selection of the articles to analyse during the P.I.R. process. This evidence sheds light on the risk of an unfruitful self-referentiality of the accounting academic literature and on the self-feeding nature of the academic world. Classification-JEL: Keywords: Note: Pages:77-94 Volume: 2016/1 Year: 2016 Issue:1 File-URL:http://www.francoangeli.it/riviste/Scheda_Rivista.aspx?IDArticolo=57661&Tipo=Articolo PDF File-Format: text/HTML Handle: RePEc:fan:Frfrfr:v:html10.3280/FR2016-001005 Number: 5 X-File-Ref: http://www.francoangeli.it/Riviste/References.ashx?idArticolo=57661 Template-type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Author-Name: Stefano Zambon Author-Name: Laura Girella Title: Accounting Theory and Accounting Practice as Loosely Coupled Systems: A Historical Perspective on the Italian Case (1930-1990) Abstract: Despite its crucial role for a practically oriented discipline such as accounting, the relationship between theory and practice in this domain appears to be relatively unexplored, and even more so it is in comparative terms. Adopting a longitudinal approach, the paper aims to investigate this relationship referring to the Italian experience in the period 1930-1990, which is set against the background of a well-known interpretation of the theory-practice interplay proposed for the USA, i.e. the "market for excuses" model (Watts and Zimmerman, 1979). In the Italian environment, the relationship between accounting theory and accounting practice shows contents and trajectories which are rather dissimilar from those implied by positive researchers with reference to the American context. In particular, it emerges that in Italy accounting theory, that has an inherent ex ante nature and is encapsulated into a wider institutionally-veined body of knowledge called ?economia aziendale?, has been in the main detached from practice and operational needs. Thus, Italian theory and practice could be fruitfully described as two loosely coupled systems with occasional and unintended intersections, each of which has its own internal logics and its own "demand-supply" dynamics. In this respect, the Watts and Zimmerman?s model denotes a limited explanatory power when applied to contexts - such as the Italian one - presenting socio-economic features, as well as a theoretical tradition, which are distinctively different from the USA. Classification-JEL: Keywords: Note: Pages:95-133 Volume: 2016/1 Year: 2016 Issue:1 File-URL:http://www.francoangeli.it/riviste/Scheda_Rivista.aspx?IDArticolo=57662&Tipo=Articolo PDF File-Format: text/HTML Handle: RePEc:fan:Frfrfr:v:html10.3280/FR2016-001006 Number: 6 X-File-Ref: http://www.francoangeli.it/Riviste/References.ashx?idArticolo=57662 Template-type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Author-Name: Allister Wilson Title: Commentary. Research and practice in accounting: A collaborative perspective Abstract: Classification-JEL: Keywords: Note: Pages:135-139 Volume: 2016/1 Year: 2016 Issue:1 File-URL:http://www.francoangeli.it/riviste/Scheda_Rivista.aspx?IDArticolo=57663&Tipo=Articolo PDF File-Format: text/HTML Handle: RePEc:fan:Frfrfr:v:html10.3280/FR2016-001007 Number: 7