Original Articles

Debiasing the curse of knowledge and audit judgement: Experience reconsidered

Published in: South African Journal of Accounting Research
Volume 15 , issue 1 , 2001 , pages: 1–17

DOI: 10.1080/10291954.2001.11435095

Author(s): R Reeve Department of Accounting and Finance, Australia , H Holmes Department of Accounting and Finance, Australia , P Li Department of Accounting and Finance, Australia , C Patel Department of Accounting and Finance, Australia

Keywords: Audit judgement , Curse of knowledge , Debias , Experience , Hindsight bias , Judgement biases , Outcome effect , Outcome knowledge bias

Download full text Get new issue alerts

Abstract

This study contributes to the research related to judgment biases in auditing by examining the extent to which relevant audit experience debiases (mitigates) the “curse of knowledge” (outcome knowledge bias} in audit judgements. Auditors, with a wide range of experience, from the Sydney, Australia, office of a Big 6 public accounting firm, participated in the Field experiment involving an internal control evaluation task. The results support the hypothesis that relevant audit experience debiases the curse of knowledge in audit judgments.

« Information for Authors

Environmental disclosure in annual reports: A legitimacy theory perspective »