Papers by Chris Van Staden
Social Responsibility Journal
Purpose This study aims to investigate how New Zealand companies use Twitter to communicate and e... more Purpose This study aims to investigate how New Zealand companies use Twitter to communicate and engage effectively with stakeholders during the COVID-19 pandemic. Design/methodology/approach This study proposes a conceptual framework for effective stakeholder engagement by using social media to analyse the themes and emotion of company tweets during the COVID-19 pandemic in New Zealand. The engagement of stakeholders with these tweets is also examined. This study argues that companies use selected themes and emotive language to connect with their stakeholders. Findings The findings show that selective themes and emotions are useful in company COVID-19 tweets to engage with the stakeholders. COVID-19 tweets contained significantly more emotion than non-COVID tweets, with emotions that can convey empathy being the most common. By presenting themselves as real, personable and empathetic towards others through emotive language, companies can engage in more meaningful and ethical way wit...
Copyright ©2011 Australasian Accounting Business and Finance Journal and Authors. Research Online... more Copyright ©2011 Australasian Accounting Business and Finance Journal and Authors. Research Online is the open access institutional repository for the
The discussion paper series of the School of Accountancy is intended to provide staff and postgra... more The discussion paper series of the School of Accountancy is intended to provide staff and postgraduate students of the School with a means of communicating new and developing ideas in order to facilitate academic debate. Discussion papers should not necessarily be taken as completed works or final expressions of opinions.
We provide an empirical analysis of the content and structure of the sustainability reports publi... more We provide an empirical analysis of the content and structure of the sustainability reports published as at January 2013 on the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) Sustainability Disclosure Database for four countries. We analyse the sustainability reports for company information, report information and report content, and evaluate the common elements and differences across the four countries. We propose that value added information could be useful as a part of sustainability reporting. In this regard we find a very high incidence of value added statements included in the Italian sustainability reports with a low incidence for the other two European countries. Our findings suggest that Value Added information plays an important role in sustainability reporting. Our study is important as it provides an understanding of Sustainability reporting in the transition to Integrated Reporting, and the role of value added information and value added statements in this process. To our knowledge ...
Tone is a means by which narratives may be imbued with a desired connotation or affect through wo... more Tone is a means by which narratives may be imbued with a desired connotation or affect through word choice. Like other elements of style, tone may be deployed to aid the dissemination of incrementally useful information or used to strategically influence perceptions. Much literature in accounting considers tone as a uni-dimensional construct. This exploratory study seeks to demonstrate that verbal tone is considerably more nuanced in nature. Using multi-year sample of listed companies, we examine dimensions of tone across multiple document types within the annual report and two components of CSR reports issued separately from the annual report. We first consider how dimensions of tone vary across different types of corporate narrative. Next, we determine whether dimensions of tone are associated with another important element of style, readability. Last, we consider the determinants of tone, including the possibility that tone may be used in impression management. The paper makes se...
Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, 2019
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate: how dimensions of tone vary across different... more Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate: how dimensions of tone vary across different forms of corporate accountability narrative; the impact of tone on readability; and the determinants of tone, including consideration of its use in impression management. Design/methodology/approach Using a multi-year sample of listed companies, the authors measure dimensions of tone across multiple narrative types within the annual report and standalone corporate social responsibility report. Statistical analysis is used to investigate variations of tone across narrative type, each dimension’s influence on readability and the role of antecedent factors. Findings Analysis reveals that dimensions of tone vary significantly across narrative types (genres) suggesting that tonal patterns form part of the specific stylistic conventions of each genre. Tone is found to be a significant determinant of readability. Little evidence of obfuscation using tone was found, while disclosure type is the...
South African Journal of Accounting Research, 1999
In this paper the predictive and explanatory power of value added information was investigated wi... more In this paper the predictive and explanatory power of value added information was investigated with regards to three external indicators by doing statistical analysis on empirical data of South African listed companies. The analysis indicated that value added information did not have significant predictive and explanatory power additional to that of earnings for the three selected external indicators. It also showed that the high inter-correlation between value added and earnings prevented value added from being used in prediction models in combination with earnings. The predictive and explanatory power of value added information therefore seems to be limited.
Journal of Business Ethics, 2016
Distributional fairness of corporate distributions is an important social issue linked to account... more Distributional fairness of corporate distributions is an important social issue linked to accounting for equality. Value added and the information contained in the value added statement can conceptually be regarded as a reflection of how the company is managed for all stakeholders. We investigate value added information published in sustainability reports to determine if the information provided is useful for assessing distributional fairness between stakeholders. We find that the value added information disclosed lack conciseness, comparability and understandability. The divergence is considerable and the explanations of the disclosed information so limited that the usefulness of the value added disclosures must be questioned. Our results suggest several obfuscating techniques in the disclosure of value added information, including disclosing information that is conceptually compromised, resulting in comparability issues and disclosing information that can't be verified by reconciling back to the financial statements. Our findings have clear ethical and moral implications as they stress the societal issue of distributional fairness. It seems that companies are either reluctant to provide value added information that is useful, or deliberately use value added disclosures to obfuscate. Information reflecting distributional fairness is therefore compromised.
South African Journal of Economic and Management Sciences, 2010
We do a survey of individual shareholders' corporate environmental disclosure needs. We find ... more We do a survey of individual shareholders' corporate environmental disclosure needs. We find that South African shareholders require companies to disclose the following specific environmental information:• Environmental risks and impacts,• Environmental policy,• Measurable environmental targets,• Performance against targets,• Environmental costs disclosed separately, and• An independent environmental audit report.Shareholders prefer this information in a separate section of the annual report and on company websites. Shareholders want such disclosure to be prescribed by law and/or stock exchange rules. The most popular reason why they want environmental information disclosed, is to hold companies accountable for their environmental stewardship. A high percentage of shareholders also indicate that they want disclosure, because they are concerned about climate change. These findings imply that legislators and standard setters may have to consider changing disclosu...
Corporate Ownership and Control, 2010
Ethical investors often exclude firms that participate in so-called controversial activities, suc... more Ethical investors often exclude firms that participate in so-called controversial activities, such as tobacco, alcohol, firearms, gambling, the military, and nuclear operations, from their investment portfolios. Firms excluded in this way should experience an increase in their cost of capital and a reduction in their share prices. We use the KLD database to identify S&P 500 firms involved in controversial activities. Our results show no difference between controversial activity firms and other firms regarding relative share price and we find that the cost of capital of controversial activity firms is in fact lower. We conclude that ethical investing, of the type that excludes controversial activity firms, does not influence the capital markets in the expected way.
Accounting and Business Research, 2016
The electricity generation industry has been under close regulatory and public scrutiny for decad... more The electricity generation industry has been under close regulatory and public scrutiny for decades for the significant impacts its activities have on the environment. The industry is responsible for a large proportion of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, which has intensified public and regulatory scrutiny of late. Therefore, electricity generation firms face immense pressure to show environmental responsibility. Firms respond with environmental disclosures in their annual reports, in stand-alone-reports, and on websites. In this study, we use comprehensive disclosure indices to measure the quality (or comprehensiveness) of the CO2 emissions related disclosure and the overall environmental disclosure of 205 electricity generation firms in 35 countries. We find that firms in countries with a high commitment towards the environment and a carbon emissions trading scheme (measures of social concern for environmental protection and emissions), are likely to disclose more comprehensive environmental information. In addition, we find that firm size, age of the assets, listing status, and media exposure influence disclosure. Environmental performance, measured by CO2 emissions, is not significantly related to environmental disclosure among our sample firms. The theoretical implication of these findings is that social beliefs (that are different in different countries) prompt a legitimating disclosure response from firms that is not significantly affected by their performance against that social belief.
Pacific Accounting Review, 2015
Purpose – This paper aims to compare the readability of narrative annual report disclosure pre- a... more Purpose – This paper aims to compare the readability of narrative annual report disclosure pre- and post-International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) adoption using a computational linguistics programme to determine if annual report disclosures have become more difficult or easier to read following the adoption of IFRS. Design/methodology/approach – This paper empirically measures narrative annual report disclosure readability pre- and post-IFRS adoption using a computational linguistics programme. In this analysis, the authors control for variables that have been identified as relevant to the understanding of financial disclosures, such as size, business volatility, financial leverage and industry. Findings – Significant relationships have been identified between IFRS adoption and reduced readability indicators using readability formulas, and also using other factors such as increased length of annual report disclosures and increased use of tables. Findings suggest that the a...
Journal of Cleaner Production, 2015
This paper identifies three conceptually distinct, but interrelated concepts regarding corporate ... more This paper identifies three conceptually distinct, but interrelated concepts regarding corporate environmental behaviour from the literature-environmental legitimacy, environmental accountability, and environmental proactivity-and shows how they can be integrated into a single framework. This is done in a context where prior studies in the literature do not relate these concepts to each other or place the concepts within a meaningful context, nor integrate them into a single framework. The framework demonstrates an organisational journey towards achieving legitimacy in environmental endeavours. Environmental legitimacy is conditional upon the public evaluation of corporate environmental performance and environmental reporting (environmental accountability), which in turn, requires organisations to invest in environmental management and accounting systems and stakeholder engagement (environmental proactivity). The paper identifies company, stakeholder and other characteristics that influence the constructs in the framework and also propose a research agenda based on this framework. Environmental performance constitutes the central concept in the framework, acknowledging that improved environmental performance promotes the ultimate goal of sustainability. The framework suggests that the judicious management of environmental performance and reporting, the two components of environmental accountability, results in environmental legitimacy. Furthermore, environmental accountability can be enhanced by environmental proactivity, a concept comprising environmental management and environmental accounting, as well as stakeholder engagement. This synthesis of the factors that influence and contribute to environmental performance is the framework"s main contribution.
The discussion paper series of the School of Accountancy is intended to provide staff and postgra... more The discussion paper series of the School of Accountancy is intended to provide staff and postgraduate students of the School with a means of communicating new and developing ideas in order to facilitate academic debate. Discussion papers should not necessarily be taken as completed works or final expressions of opinions.
Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, 2014
Purpose - – The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the current discussions about the conce... more Purpose - – The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the current discussions about the concept of Integrated Reporting (IR) and provides a practical and useful proposal of an instrument that could help to apply the IR concept in corporate practice. Design/methodology/approach - – The study uses a deductive normative research approach. Findings - – Based on a comprehensive review of international literature and research, the paper argues that a structured presentation of the traditional measure of “value added” in a so-called “value added statement” (VAS) has the potential to serve as a practical and effective reporting instrument for IR. The proposed VAS not only meets the guiding principles of IR but also reports on the monetary effects of different types of capital included in IR and in this way complements and represents the concept of IR very well. Research limitations/implications - – The authors intend to stimulate the academic as well as institutional discussion on how to apply the concept of IR at the corporate level. As the characteristics of the proposed VAS comply well with the guiding principles and concepts developed in the Integrated Reporting Framework project of the International Integrated Reporting Council (IIRC) and with the ultimate objective of integrated thinking, the study can inform the current considerations within and outside of the IIRC. Originality/value - – The future of IR and the probability of its world-wide application in practice will depend on the development of appropriate reporting tools that incorporate the central ideas of IR, currently no such reporting tools exist. In this paper the authors make an argument for a VAS as a complementing, useful and therefore appropriate reporting tool for IR.
SSRN Electronic Journal, 2004
This paper investigates the motivation for the voluntary disclosure of financial information by c... more This paper investigates the motivation for the voluntary disclosure of financial information by companies in their annual financial statements, by examining aspects of the usefulness of the value added statement. The value added statement is published voluntarily with the annual financial statements and is currently experiencing high levels of publication in South Africa, which is evidently brought about by the high political costs and significant legitimacy threats that companies operating in South Africa are facing.
SSRN Electronic Journal, 2004
South Africa is at present experiencing the highest incidence of publication of the value added s... more South Africa is at present experiencing the highest incidence of publication of the value added statement reported anywhere in the world to date. In addition research investigating the predictive ability of value added information has been conducted in the USA since 1990, even though the value added statement has not been published there. The research reported in this paper sets out to establish whether the value added statement is a disclosure worth considering by companies around the world, by investigating the South African experience with the value added statement. The social accounting theories of organisational legitimacy and political costs were found to be best suited to explain why the value added statement is published. Surveys among the companies publishing the value added statement indicated that management had the employees in mind when they published this information. However, a survey among users has indicated that very little use has been made of the value added statement. The main reason for this seems to be that the unregulated nature of the value added statement allows for inconsistencies in disclosures, which eventually caused users to suspect bias in the reports. The USA evidence that the information has additional predictive power is not confirmed by a South African study, and is complicated by the limited additional information contained in the value added statement. The South African experience with the value added statement does not make a convincing case for publication. Rather, it highlights the need for unbiased and verified social disclosures that will be useful to all the stakeholders of the company. In addition, it has implications for other voluntary social and environmental disclosures.
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Papers by Chris Van Staden