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ABSTRACT
The primary objective of this paper is to provide a descriptive database on task structure, minimum professional rank and decision aids applicable to perform each task in a comprehensive inventory of audit tasks. In addition, analysis of the data and insight are provided as a means of motivating future behavioral research, particularly in areas of expertise, staff training and assignment, and decision aid development. To achieve these objectives, a comprehensive inventory of audit tasks was developed and presented to audit managers and partners for their assessment of task structure, professional rank and decision aids. The data are presented by various audit phases and in detail for each of the 332 audit tasks investigated.
INTRODUCTION
Recent literature has emphasized the need for consideration of task structure in behavioral research. For example, Abdolmohammadi and Wright (1987) provided evidence that task structure explains experience effects in a variety of audit tasks. They reported differences in audit judgments between experienced and inexperienced auditors for unstructured and some semistructured tasks, but not for structured tasks. More recently, Bonner (1994) extended this work by developing a general model of the effects of audit task complexity on judgment performance and called for further research on a variety of related issues including measurement of audit task complexity (e.g., task structure).
The importance of identifying task-specific knowledge needed to perform each audit task is also emphasized in the behavioral literature (Ashton 1991; Bedard and Chi 1993; Bonner 1990; Bonner and Lewis 1990; Bonner and Pennington 1991; Davis and Solomon 1989; Frederick and Libby 1986; Libby 1995; Wright 1988). These authors have generally agreed that superior performance requires task-specific knowledge. However, direct measurement of task-specific knowledge has proven difficult and researchers have generally used audit experience as a proxy for task-specific knowledge in laboratory settings. For example, in a study of 19 judgment-oriented audit tasks of varying structure, Prawitt (1995) found that differences in task-specific experience requirement (i.e., staff assignments by audit managers) were explained by structure measures at the task level. This finding was consistent across the then Big 6 audit firms regardless of their audit methodologies.
The literature cited indicates that both task structure and taskspecific knowledge should be investigated to assist in behavioral research. Cushing and Loebbecke (1986) classified...