스케일 효과를 통제한 직급 감사시간과 감사품질의 관계:비표준화의 경우와 비교를 중심으로

초록

This study examines the impact of standardizing rank-specific audit hours by personnel numbers on audit quality and investigates whether these effects vary across different ranks. It also compares the influence of audit hours on audit quality between standardized and non-standardized scenarios across five audit ranks. The research considers both size measures and relative proportion measures of audit hours as key variables. Data from listed companies spanning 2014 to 2020 were analyzed, yielding the following insights. Firstly, when audit hours were standardized by personnel numbers and logarithmically transformed, the audit hours of quality control reviewers (hereafter Q), engagement partners (P), and specialists in IT, tax, and corporate valuation (C) were found to significantly reduce discretionary accruals, thereby enhancing audit quality. In contrast, without standardization, the audit hours of registered CPAs (A), along with those of Q, P, and C, also exhibited a significant negative relationship with discretionary accruals. Secondly, when standardized by personnel numbers and analyzed using relative proportion measures, higher proportions of audit hours for P and C were associated with a significant reduction in discretionary accruals. Conversely, a greater proportion of audit hours for A was linked to a significant increase in discretionary accruals. In non-standardized analyses, only P maintained consistent results, while A and C were not significant. However, a higher proportion of trainee CPA (J) hours was significantly associated with increased discretionary accruals. These findings highlight that the relationship between rank-specific audit hours and audit quality is not uniform across ranks and is influenced by whether standardization is applied. Specifically, the results for A, J, and C varied significantly depending on whether standardization and measurement methods (size versus relative proportion) were used. When standardization accounted for scale effects, non-standardized cases showed overestimation issues with size measures and underestimation issues with relative proportion measures, mainly due to the lack of scale control in the audit hours of registered CPAs. This pattern persisted even when loss avoidance was used as the dependent variable instead of discretionary accruals. The study’s findings underscore the importance of adequately controlling for scale effects when examining the relationship between rank-specific audit hours and audit quality. Failing to do so can lead to unintended consequences, with different evidence emerging depending on whether standardization is applied.

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