The Development of an Instructional Intervention for Auditing Learning
: Evidence from Thailand

  • Chanida Yarana

    Student thesis: Doctoral ThesisDoctor of Philosophy

    Abstract

    The changes in economy in addition to globalisation have impacted upon the audit profession. After the economic crisis in the 2000s, the audit profession was deemed to be a cause of the corporate collapse due to unethical behaviour of auditors. This issue also impacts upon auditing instruction worldwide, including Thailand where political and economic crises along with corruption issues have become significant and urgent problems in the Thai society. There has been a high scrutiny on capabilities, competence and ethics of auditors from the public and other stakeholders, whereas there is scant evidence to show whether Thai educators take action on enhancing holistic attributes of their auditing students, in particular, ethical sensitivity of the students. Thereby, Thailand needs to reform the quality of audit education in order to serve qualified graduate students to the business environment.

    This thesis developed a set of reflective case studies as an instructional intervention for auditing learning. It aims to enhance professional knowledge, skills and ethics of auditing students in Thailand. Four learning theories comprising Transformative Learning Theory (TLT), Experiential Learning Theory (ELT), Reflective Learning Theory (RLT) and Project-based Learning Theory (PLT) were applied as the theoretical framework. In addition, this thesis applied concepts of qualitative and action research together with the ADDIE instructional development as the practical framework for the development of an instructional intervention.

    There were five phases of the ADDIE model: Analyse, Design, Develop, Implement and Evaluate applied to organise the empirical work. Two empirical fieldworks were conducted within university settings in Thailand. The first fieldwork complied with the analysing phase of the ADDIE model exploring current practice and problems of audit instruction in Thailand in order to identify performance gap of the audit education. Semi-structured interviews were conducted in 11 universities with 34 participants who were audit lecturers and students in five regions throughout the country. The results showed that in general, audit instructors in Thailand mostly applied traditional teaching methods. However, there were problems of audit instruction comprising inappropriate learning strategies of the students, lack of staff and learning resources, deficiencies of knowledge and skills of audit students and lack of ethical awareness of the students. Significantly, the participants required case studies in Thai context as a learning tool to enhance the knowledge, skills and ethics of Thai auditing students. These elements were determined as performance gap which was required to improve.

    In response to the results of the first empirical fieldwork, the thesis applied the design and development phases of the ADDIE model to develop a set of reflective case studies for auditing students. A framework for the development of case studies derived from other professional education such as law, medicine, nursing and engineering where such real-life case studies have been successfully used to enhance ethical sensitivity of students. Additionally, concepts of reflective writing and audit working paper were applied in the cases studies. Other instruments such as guidance for lecturers and students were also developed for Thai auditing students. All instructional resources were validated by experts. The final version was refined and approved before the implementation.

    The second empirical fieldwork complied with the implement and evaluate phases of the ADDIE model. An experiment conducted with 77 auditing students in Naresuan University, Phitsanulok, Thailand. In addition, there were 15 participants who voluntarily participated in the reflective writing activity and the focus group interview. The results revealed that before the cases’ implementation, students had negative views on auditing learning. However, during and after the implementation, students had reformed their way of learning, attitudes towards auditing learning and ethical sensitivity.
    Date of Award2016
    Original languageEnglish
    Awarding Institution
    • University of Dundee
    SponsorsNaresuan University
    SupervisorLissa Monk (Supervisor), Vicky Lambert (Supervisor) & Rosabel Michaelson (Supervisor)

    Keywords

    • Accounting and Auditing Education
    • Case studies in auditing
    • Instructional Intervention
    • Action research
    • ADDIE model
    • Ethics teaching

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