The First Course in Accounting: Students’ Perceptions and Their Effect on the Decision to Major in Accounting
by
Marshall A. Geiger Associate Professor of Accounting E. C. Robins School Of Business University of Richmond 28 Westhampton Way Richmond, VA 23173 804/287-1923
[email protected] or
[email protected]
and
Suzanne M. Ogilby Professor of Accounting School of Business Administration California State University—Sacramento 6000 J Street Sacramento, CA 95819 916/278-7157
[email protected]
DRAFT: July 10, 2000 Please do not quote without permission. We would like to thank the instructors that took part in this study, the participants at the 1998 American Accounting Association Western Region and Annual Meetings, Lamont Steedle, the reviewers, and the editor, Jim Rebele for comments on earlier drafts of the paper. We also thank Christine Yap for her data assistance.
The First Course in Accounting: Students’ Perceptions and Their Effect on the Decision to Major in Accounting ABSTRACT Little empirical evidence exists regarding students’ perceptions of the first course in accounting and the effect of these perceptions on deciding whether or not to major in accounting. The purpose of this study is to begin examining student perceptions regarding the first accounting course and how those perceptions relate to selection of accounting as a major. The study separately examines initial perceptions and changes in perceptions over the semester for intended accounting and non-accounting majors, and assesses the association of individual accounting instructors with changed student perceptions. We then examine the relationship between perceptual changes, final grades, and individual instructors on decisions to major in accounting. Responses from 331 introductory financial accounting students from two universities indicate that while intended accounting majors perceived the course more favorably than nonaccounting majors at the beginning and end of the semester, both groups exhibited relatively positive attitudes toward the course. However, these attitudes were similarly less favorable by the end of the course for both groups. We also found evidence of the important role individual instructors play regarding changing student perceptions and selection of accounting as a major. The analyses for selection of accounting as a major indicate that the decision depended on initially intending to major in accounting, performance in the first course, and individual instructors, but not on changes in perception regarding the first course.
The First Course in Accounting: Students’ Perceptions and Their Effect on the Decision to Major in Accounting INTRODUCTION The Accounting Education Change Commission (AECC), and several other groups within the accounting profession (e.g., AAA, 1986; Arthur Andersen & Co. et al. 1989) have identified the first course in accounting as a critical educational component for not only accounting, but for all business majors (AECC, 1992). In addition to these formal organizations, various individual accounting educators have discussed the role of the introductory course in the accounting and business curriculum (e.g., Cherry and Reckers, 1983; Baldwin and Ingram, 1991; Pincus, 1997; Vangermeersch, 1997). The importance of this first course lies in its ability to both present useful accounting information that can lead to better business decision-making for all business majors, and attract, or discourage, individuals from becoming accounting majors. The AECC (1992) has also argued that the first course in accounting is critically important for its potential impact on student perceptions regarding the accounting profession and an individual’s chances for success as an accounting professional: The course shapes their perceptions of (1) the profession, (2) the aptitudes and skills needed for successful careers in accounting, and (3) the nature of career opportunities in accounting. These perceptions affect whether the supply of talent will be sufficient for the profession to thrive (pp. 1-2). The implied mandate of the AECC, as well as previous calls from within the profession, appears to be based partially on the potential of the first course to affect student perception - or what has generally been referred to as the affective domain of education (Krathwohl, Bloom and Masia, 1964; Wilson, 1988). To date, however, no empirical evidence exists as to what perceptions students actually hold toward the first course in accounting and the impact of their perceptions on selection of accounting as a major. For example, before students enter the course, do they believe that the course will be useful? Rewarding? Boring? Do intended accounting
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majors perceive the first accounting course differently than their non-accounting peers? Do students’ perceptions about the course change over the semester? Do students with positive changes in perception choose to become accounting majors? This study begins to empirically investigate student perceptions regarding the first accounting course, including changes in those perceptions throughout the semester. The study also examines changes in perception across individual instructors and the relationship of perceptual changes with students’ decision to major, or not major, in accounting.
PRIOR LITERATURE A significant number of studies have been conducted to address various aspects of the introductory accounting course. Among other things, these studies have examined the determinants of student performance in the first accounting course (Eskew & Faley, 1988; Doran, Bouillon and Smith, 1991; Wooten, 1998), the possible effect of gender on accounting course performance (Buckless, Lipe and Ravenscroft, 1991) and the prediction of student performance in upper-level accounting courses based, in part, on performance in the introductory courses (Danko, Duke and Franz, 1992; Bernardi and Bean, 1999). There has also been a sizable amount of research and discussion on the appropriate content of the first accounting course (e.g., Cherry and Reckers, 1983; Baldwin and Ingram, 1991; AECC, 1992; Cherry and Mintz, 1996; Pincus, 1997; Vangermeersch, 1997). The summaries of accounting education research presented by Williams et al. (1988) and Rebele et al. (1991, 1998), however, reveal that no empirical study has performed a direct assessment of accounting students’ perceptions regarding any individual accounting course. Nor has any study performed an assessment of the relationship between course perceptions and major selection.
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A study by Friedlan (1995) asked Canadian accounting students both at the beginning and end of the course the perceived importance of 12 skills on their ability to perform well in introductory accounting, and the importance of 13 skills for performance as accounting practitioners. While the Friedlan study assessed students’ perceptions of the skills needed to perform well academically and professionally, it did not directly assess students’ perceptions of the introductory accounting course itself. There has also been some empirical research concerning how various categories of instructors (e.g., accounting, business) view the first course in accounting (e.g., Cherry and Mintz, 1996) and on students’ general perception of accounting, accountants, and the accounting profession (e.g., Paolillo and Estes, 1982; Cory, 1992; Cohen and Hanno, 1993). However, studies involving student perception in accounting typically ask students one or only a few attitudinal/perceptual questions at the end of the course. These studies then compare responses to these few items across groups of students exposed to different pedagogy during the course (e.g., Daroca and Nourayi, 1994; Saudagaran, 1996; Hill, 1998). Accordingly, these prior studies have incorporated attitudinal questions, but have not adequately addressed student attitudes. Additionally, there have been several studies that have attempted to examine whether the introductory accounting course has the ability to attract “the best and the brightest” students to accounting (e.g., Inman, Wentzler, and Wicker, 1989; Baldwin and Ingram, 1991; Adams, Pryor, and Adams, 1994; Nelson and Deines, 1995; Riordan, St. Pierre, and Matoney, 1996). Riordan, et al. (1996) examined whether the introductory course appeared to attract or retain quality students (as measured by GPA). They found that the mean GPA of intended accounting majors was higher than that of non-accounting students before the introductory course, and that students transferring into accounting after the course had higher GPAs than those transferring out. These
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results suggest that the introductory course may retain quality students and may actually attract higher performing students to major in accounting. A study by Cohen and Hanno (1993) used the theory of planned behavior to predict and explain the choice of accounting as a major. Their results indicate that students chose not to major in accounting because they perceived it to be too number-oriented and boring. Intended accounting majors were also found to place more emphasis than intended non-accounting majors on high performance in the introductory courses in their selection of a major. In a related study, Stice et al. (1997) categorized students as being “qualified” or “unqualified” to major in accounting based on performance in the introductory course. Their results indicate that course performance was not significantly related to the decision to major in accounting when examining just the “qualified” (i.e. high performing) students. That is, just because a student performs well in introductory accounting does not mean that they will choose to major in accounting. Their results are consistent with those of Adams et al. (1994) who found that students’ responses to the item “genuine interest in the field,” as opposed to actual course performance, was the most significant factor in deciding to major in accounting. However, none of these prior studies present a direct examination of student perceptions toward the introductory accounting course and how these perceptions relate to the decision to major in accounting. Stice et al. (1997) argue that while performance may serve as a screening device, future research should focus on identifying non-performance factors that affect the decision to major in accounting. Further, no study in accounting has examined the possible differential effect of individual instructors on students’ decisions to major in accounting. Although prior researchers (e.g., Daroca and Nourayi, 1994) have inferred that there may be a differential impact of individual faculty members on introductory accounting students, this conjecture has not been tested empirically.
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Affective Domain Students’ perceptions regarding the first course in accounting can generally be considered to be part of the larger affective domain of education (Krathwohl et al. 1964). While student learning occurs in both the cognitive and affective domains (Bloom et al. 1956; Wilson, 1988), the affective domain encompasses learning objectives that “emphasize a feeling tone, an emotion, or degree of acceptance or rejection” (Krathwohl et al. 1964, 7). Such learning objectives are often expressed as interests, attitudes, perceptions, values, emotions, or appreciation. While these objectives differ from cognitive domain objectives (e.g., the aspects of knowledge, comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis, and evaluation), they are nonetheless closely related to learning (Bloom et al. 1971) and to the selection of a major area of study (Adams et al. 1994). In fact, Munsterberg (1914) argued almost a century ago that: “The chief motive of human actions lies in feelings and emotions. If education is to secure certain actions, the safest way will be by developing certain likes and dislikes, pleasures and displeasures, enthusiasms and aversions” (p. 196). According to Krathwohl et al. (1964), the affective domain is comprised of five stages and begins at the level of receiving or attending in which the student is simply sensitized to the existence of a particular phenomenon. The second level of the hierarchy is responding, in which the student is somewhat committed to the phenomenon so that he or she will pursue involvement in it. Valuing, the third level of the hierarchy, indicates that the student believes the phenomenon has worth. The fourth and fifth levels of the hierarchy are attained as the student has increasingly positive internalized values relating to multiple phenomena and begins the process of organizing those values and integrating them into a total philosophy. While the last two affect levels, organizing and integrating, are important for higher order learning within any discipline, their assessment in introductory accounting students, including
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intended accounting majors, is somewhat premature. Accordingly, this study presents a general assessment of the first three affect levels and attempts to examine students’ general perceptions, values, expectations, and attitudes about the first course in accounting and how these perceptions are related to the decision to major in accounting. Based on the existing literature discussed in this section, we examine the following research questions in this study: Q1
What are students' initial perceptions regarding the introductory accounting course?
Q2
Do intended accounting majors have different initial perceptions compared to non-accounting majors?
Q3
Do students' perceptions of the introductory course change over the semester?
Q4
Do changes in students’ perceptions differ across individual instructors?
Q5
How are students’ perceptio ns and course performance related to the decision to major in accounting?
METHOD Instrument The instrument used to assess students’ general perceptions toward the first accounting course was a self-report, paper and pencil questionnaire administered during class in the first and last weeks of the introductory financial accounting course. The questionnaire contained ten statements regarding students' perceptions of the course across a variety of affect dimensions. Questionnaire items cover varying aspects of the first three affect levels (Krathwohl et al. 1964), and were adapted from questions used in an earlier pilot study on introductory accounting students (Watkins and Ogilby, 1996). We also included an item regarding students’ perceptions of how important their instructors are in affecting their opinion of the course. In addition, as an
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overall reflection of students’ perceptions of their ability to do well in the course, instruments at the beginning and end of the course asked students their expected grade. The list of items presented to students at the beginning of the semester is presented in Table 1. Students responded to the ten perception statements on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from strongly agree (“5”) to strongly disagree (“1”). Students indicated their expected course grade for the final item, which was then converted to a five-point scale.
--Insert Table 1 Here--
The end-of-semester instrument contained the same items as presented in Table 1, except that items were reworded where necessary to reflect past tense. The only exception was that item number five (LOOK/ENJOY) was modified from "I am looking forward to this course" at the beginning of the semester to "I have enjoyed this course" at the end of the semester. Irrespective of the arguments presented by the AECC (1992) concerning the general business usefulness of the first accounting course, the first two items (i.e., COURSES and CAREER) were anticipated to be perceived as more valuable, a priori, by students intending to be accounting majors. The remaining items were felt to be more neutral with respect to selected major and to be potentially equally applicable to all students. However, due to the natural tendency of students to perceive a course in their major more positively than non-majors, we separately examine responses over the semester for accounting and non-accounting majors. The first instrument also collected demographic data such as gender, GPA, SAT scores, and intended major as of the start of the course. Since the vast majority of students in the study were first semester sophomores, several students (n = 77) had not yet decided on a specific
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business major at the time of first administration. 1 These undecided students were classified as non-accounting majors, and to a large extent represent the pool of students intended to be influenced by the first accounting course to possibly consider accounting as a major (AECC, 1992; Cohen and Hanno, 1993). We then examined subsequent student records for evidence of major selection immediately after the course. University records are available by semester and indicate the intended major of the student, which was required for registration purposes. Accordingly, we were generally able to identify subsequent selection of a major for students immediately following the course, including those originally undecided at the beginning of the course.
Subjects Student participants in this study were enrolled in introductory financial accounting (i.e. the first required accounting course) in two medium-sized public universities in the United States during the fall semester. We included universities from two different geographic areas (i.e., east coast and west coast) to get a broader representation of accounting students in the United States. All sections of introductory financial accounting at the two universities participated in the study. Additionally, eight different instructors (four from each university) taught these students, and all used a fairly "traditional" lecture/discussion format. 2 Neither university used “mass lecture” sections during our study. While the content covered in these courses was typical of an introductory financial accounting course, and coordinated within each university, faculty had the usual latitude in material sequencing, presentation, emphasis, assignments, and student testing and evaluation. In order to assess changes in perception and the impact of perceptions on selection of a major, students that did not respond to instruments both at the beginning and end of the semester
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were eliminated. We also eliminated students for which we could not obtain final grades or selection of a major data subsequent to the course (e.g., student received an incomplete or withdrew from school). These requirements resulted in 331 students (117 and 206 from the two universities) who properly completed both instruments and for which all data were available. 3 Of the 331 students, 175 were males, 45 indicated at the beginning of the semester that they intended to major in accounting, and 53 students selected accounting as their major immediately after the course.
RESULTS Table 2 presents demographic data for intended accounting and non-accounting majors at the beginning of the course. As seen in the table, there was no difference in overall GPA between accounting and non-accounting majors, but accounting majors had higher SAT-math scores and lower SAT-verbal scores (p
