An empirical examination of senior accounting students' ethical reaction to grade inflation

Abstract

This study examines the ethical behaviour of accounting students. In contrast to most prior studies which have examined perceptions of accounting students, this study investigates the action of accounting students with respect to ethical issues. More specifically, this research investigates whether students behave ethically when they have been exposed to ethical issues but confront a situation in which they have a direct stake. The results of a laboratory experiment using students enrolled in two auditing classes showed that students, in spite of exposure to ethical issues, did not behave ethically in a situation where their interests were directly involved. The implications of the findings as well as future directions are provided in the paper.