• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.11 no.1
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• pp.10-18
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• 2020

Background: The elevated risk of occupational infection such as tuberculosis among health workers in many countries raises the question of whether the quality of occupational health and safety (OHS) and infection prevention and control (IPC) can be improved by auditing. The objectives of this study were to measure (1) audited compliance of primary health-care facilities in South Africa with national standards for OHS and IPC, (2) change in compliance at reaudit three years after baseline, and (3) the inter-rater reliability of the audit. Methods: The study analyzed audits of 60 primary health-care facilities in the Western Cape Province of South Africa. Baseline external audits in the time period 2011-2012 were compared with follow-up internal audits in 2014-2015. Audits at 25 facilities that had both internal and external audits conducted in 2014/2015 were used to measure reliability. Results: At baseline, 25% of 60 facilities were "noncompliant" (audit score<50%), 48% "conditionally compliant" (score >50 < 80%), and only 27% "compliant" (score >80%). Overall, there was no significant improvement in compliance three years after baseline. Percentage agreement on specific items between internal and external audits ranged from 28% to 92% and kappa from -0.8 to 0.41 (poor to moderate). Conclusion: Low baseline compliance with OHS-IPC measures and lack of improvement over three years reflect the difficulties of quality improvement in these domains. Low inter-rater reliability of the audit instrument undermines the audit process. Evidence-based investment of effort is required if repeat auditing is to contribute to occupational risk reduction for health workers.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.8 no.5
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• pp.151-156
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• 2021

This paper empirically examines the relationship between one of the major corporate governance attributes; family ownership and the audit committee activity across a sample of 430 publicly traded firms on the Saudi Stock Exchange (Tadawul) for the period 2012-2019. Using the Pooled OLS regression, this study finds that family ownership is negatively associated with audit committee activity. This study reported that family ownership is negatively associated with audit committee activity, giving support to the convergence-of-interest hypothesis. Therefore, the existence of family ownership as a monitoring corporate governance mechanism substitutes the audit committee activity as another monitoring mechanism. This study provides empirical evidence on the associations of two internal corporate governance mechanisms, namely; family ownership and audit committee activity in the Saudi context where there is a paucity of research in this area. The findings of this study provide a new understanding regarding the extent to which family ownership impacts the activity of audit committees in manufacturing companies. Similarly, the companies' management, external auditors, bankers, and companies would also benefit from understanding the influential factors of the audit committee activities.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.8 no.4
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• pp.797-808
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• 2021

This study examines the interaction between internal auditors' personality traits and the internal audit function effectiveness. It also investigates the effect of such interacted variables on financial reporting quality. This study employed a questionnaire survey to collect data from 193 internal auditors of Jordanian companies listed on the Amman Stock Exchange. The study model is validated and tested using the partial least squares structural equation modelling. The results reveal that all the examined personality traits of internal auditors significantly impact internal audit function effectiveness except for the extraversion trait. The results also show that personality traits have indirect effects on financial reporting quality via internal audit function effectiveness. These results suggest that internal auditors with high scores on openness to experience, emotional stability, and conscientiousness traits can be among the most significant contributors to the internal audit function effectiveness. The results also suggest that internal auditors' personality traits can be regarded as an internal audit function intangible resource that enhances effectiveness. The study's findings might be of interest to many different parties interested in enhancing internal audit function effectiveness and boosting the financial reporting quality, such as external and internal auditors, auditees, human resource departments, and Chief Internal Audit Executives.

• Management & Information Systems Review
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• v.35 no.3
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• pp.231-247
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• 2016

This study, according to the amendment of the Act on External Audit, on the basis of the number of input auditors, the content of auditing, and audit times as additional informations, calculates the average of the samples listed companies with assets of one hundred billion KRW. However, since the actual number of the subject corporations of which asset is 100 billion KRW is small, it is difficult to extract data with reference to this asset size. Therefore, the samples were extended to 50 corporations of which asset is 10% less than 100 billion KRW and other 50 more corporations of which asset is 10% more than 100 billion KRW. As a result, a total of 100 corporations were included as samples. To calculate the average of the audit times, a t-test was performed between the two groups. The result of the t-test showed that there is not a significant difference between the two groups. According to the analytical results of the t-test, the average of the number of input auditors and the average of audit times were calculated with respect to all the 100 samples. A further analysis showed that the average of audit content in the present study was compared with the estimated values in the study of Mun (2016). Although the results of this study may not be the optimal number, they may be used as a fundamental index which may be compared with the audit times and the audit fees in the current audit market where there is not an available reference. In addition, the amendment of the Act on External Audit may enhance the independence of auditors and the transparency of accounting system when compared with the previous system where only the total audit times were disclosed.

• Journal of the Korea Society of Computer and Information
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• v.19 no.12
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• pp.339-348
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• 2014

This study searches an improvement scheme of auditing on international financial environment since enforcing IFRS in order to secure transparency and reliability in corporate accounting and credibility in external audit from 2011 K-IFRS. As improvement schemes for the issue of the audit on K-GAAP are: First, the guarantee of the auditor's qualities of duties and talents about the lack of accountability and awareness and independence of auditor are needed. Secondly, the free acceptance or certified public accountant is adopted. Third, the non-Executive Director shall be granted. Fourth, the external auditor CPA and Auditor's remuneration should be increased. Fifth, the auditor's shares shall be limited. Sixth, the external audit to supervise and the ratio of supervision should increase. Finally, the foreign corporation for the time being limited to increase our competitiveness.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.593-604
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• 2022

This study examines how auditors respond to labor investment inefficiency, specifically its impact on audit fees and audit hours. Using a sample of Korean firms listed on the Korea Stock Exchange from 2003 to 2018, our empirical results indicate that firms involved in inefficient investment in labor incur higher audit fees and audit hours. This implies that auditors consider inefficient labor investment to cause considerable business risk, thus requesting higher external audit fees to compensate for higher audit risk. Furthermore, auditors expend more time and effort while auditing those firms by expanding the audit procedures to reduce the audit risk to an acceptable level. Finally, this study provides empirical evidence on whether the investment inefficiency in labor, an important factor in firms' competitiveness, incur higher audit fees as well as audit hours.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.9-17
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• 2020

This study examines the effect of financial reporting opacity and audit quality on stock price crash risk using listed firms in Japan. This study is the first research to examine the effect of financial reporting opacity on crash risk using a Japanese listed company. Furthermore, the effect of audit quality on crash risk is verified. High level auditors can mitigate crash risk by playing a role as a corporate governance device mechanism to reduce agency costs. We use a logistic regression and linear regression model to test whether financial reporting opacity and audit quality affect crash risk using listed firms in the Japanese stock exchange market during the fiscal years 2015 January through 2017 February. The results of this study suggest that the financial reporting opacity variable shows a positive relationship with CRASH, which states that a firm with more opaque financial reporting increases crash risk. The results suggest also that the firms audited by Big4 auditors experience less crash risk, implying that the audit quality in Japan can be one of the factors mitigating firm's crash risk. This study provides implications for financial reporting and audit quality to external stakeholders who wants to avoid losses.

• KSCI Review
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• v.11 no.1
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• pp.9-17
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• 2003

Along with trends of other countries, the Ministry of Information and Communication in Korea decided to operate an Information System Audit Institution for raising qualify of computer network facilitated in state organ and public institution, and to construct effective construction of information system. The aim of the audit institution is applying it to public information business, establishing an information system audit qualification system, and upbringing Private audit organs. The Ministry of Information and Communication realized that although the demand of information system area audit is explosively expanding, the National Computerization Agency cannot satisfies the demand and realize to have audit control for the information of national business as well. The Ministry of Information and Communication plan to enforce the audit on public information business by correlate with information business. The ministry enforce that the supervisory company has major roll to audit and national import business decided by the Information Promotion Committee is subject to have audit control. Therefore, in this paper, the contents of internal audit among internal/external audit will be presented.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.32 no.4
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• pp.122-129
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• 2021

Purpose: This study aimed to design a multipurpose dose verification phantom for external audits to secure safe and optimal radiation therapy. Methods: In this study, we used International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) LiF powder thermoluminescence dosimeter (TLD), which is generally used in the therapeutic radiation dose assurance project. The newly designed multipurpose phantom (MPP) consists of a container filled with water, a TLD holder, and two water-pressing covers. The size of the phantom was designed to be sufficient (30×30×30 cm³). The water container was filled with water and pressed with the cover for normal incidence to be fixed. The surface of the MPP was devised to maintain the same distance from the source at all times, even in the case of oblique incidence regardless of the water level. The MPP was irradiated with 6, 10, and 15 MV photon beams from Varian Linear Accelerator and measured by a 1.25 cm³ ionization chamber to get the correction factors. Monte Carlo (MC) simulation was also used to compare the measurements. Results: The result obtained by MC had a relatively high uncertainty of 1% at the dosimetry point, but it showed a correction factor value of 1.3% at the 5 cm point. The energy dependence was large at 6 MV and small at 15 MV. Various dosimetric parameters for external audits can be performed within an hour. Conclusions: The results allow an objective comparison of the quality assurance (QA) of individual hospitals. Therefore, this can be employed for external audits or QA systems in radiation therapy institutions.

• Journal of the Korea Convergence Society
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.321-329
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• 2022

This study analyzes how companies of prospector type with inherent risks from new products and R&D costs affect audit hours, and further analyzes how they affect rank-specific audit hours. Samples were empirically analyzed using samples from 2018 to 2019 for KOSPI-listed and KOSDAQ-listed companies. As a result of the analysis, first, it was found that auditors were aware of the inherent risks of companies of prospector type and were striving to improve audit quality. Second, it was found that the corresponding degree of risk differs depending on the position and role in the audit team, so higher efforts were made in core positions with high risk levels. The results of this study are meaningful in verifying how the type of Business Strategies affects the audit efforts and resource input of auditors who are external parties, not internal factors such as financial reporting quality or tax avoidance. It also has important implications that a company's Business Strategies can be an significant factor to consider in preparing policies and systems for improving audit quality.