空气污染是否会对审计工作产生不利影响——来自审计调整的证据

Does Air Pollution Have an Adverse Effect on Auditors?Evidence from Audit Adjustment in China

审计质量是会计师事务所取得社会公众信任并保护公共利益的关键,而审计师的工作过程及结果直接影响到审计质量。本文利用中国独特的研究场景和审计数据,探讨空气污染对审计过程的影响以及会计师事务所质量控制在其中发挥的作用。研究发现,审计期间客户所在地的空气污染越严重,审计师对公司会计盈余进行审计调整的概率越低,表明空气污染对审计师的专业判断产生负面影响。机制检验表明,空气污染导致的审计投入不足制约了审计证据收集和审计问题识别,进而影响审计师的专业判断。进一步的研究发现,会计师事务所的质量控制体系和审计师经验可以缓解空气污染对审计师专业判断的不利影响。上述结果表明,空气污染可能通过审计活动影响资本市场的资源配置效率。

Audit quality plays a key role in gaining public trust and protecting public interests,while the audit process and output affect audit quality directly.Using the unique setting and audit data in China,this paper investigates the influence of air pollution on audit process and the role of quality control system of audit firm.We find that air pollution significantly reduces the probability of audit adjustments to earnings,which indicates air pollution has negative impacts on auditors’judgment.Further analysis shows that lack of audit efforts caused by air pollution restricts the collection of audit evidence and identification of auditing risk,which in turn affects the auditor’s professional judgment.Besides,we also find that both the quality control system of audit firm and the auditor’s experience are helpful to mitigate the adverse effect of air pollution on auditor’s judgment.Our paper indicates that air pollution may affect the resource allocation of capital markets through audit activities.