Abstract This article presents a study conducted to analyze the effect of differential instructional techniques upon the attitudes of students in an introductory accounting principles course. The introductory accounting principles course at many universities is frequently unsatisfactory to both faculty and students. Typically, it is a service course; i.e., it is a requirement for all business majors. Thus, the classes often contain a substantial number of students who have little or no interest in the subject matter. The principles course is one of the most important offerings of the accounting department for the simple reason that it usually determines those students who will become accounting majors. The students who: do poorly in material comprehension, or are not "turned on" by a highly mechanical and/or traditionally instructed course will find their areas of concentration in other disciplines. In the study, beginning accounting students at Case Western Reserve University were asked to respond to statements concerning Accounting Principles I, relating their answers to the course and its material content, not to the job their instructors did or did not do in their presentations.

Abstract This article presents a study conducted to compare published accounting research and qualities of accounting faculty and doctoral programs. Recently, two studies have been published in which accounting departments were ranked according to some perceived criterion of excellence. Neither of these studies described the criterion of excellence to be utilized in the development of the rankings; rather they allowed the respondents to use their own subjective criteria. Objective criteria would be preferable as a basis for assessing the quality of the various accounting departments. One such criterion is the amount of research which is attributable to each department, and an indicator of research output is the number of articles published in the accounting journals. The results of this study are subject to several limitations. The study only analyzed the research which has been published in four accounting journals, one of which is published by the University of Chicago. No attempt was made to evaluate the effect of differences in the sizes of accounting faculties or doctoral programs.

Abstract This article presents a straightforward decision rule for selecting an inventory valuation price at lower-of-cost or market. This decision rule avoids the complexities of decision tables and algebraic equations; thereby, allowing students of accounting to concentrate on mastering the concepts of lower-of-cost or market valuation. Accounting educators concerned with student achievement continually seek decision tables and algebraic equations which clarify or hasten an understanding of accounting concepts. Usually, such educators prefer straightforward decision rules which do as good as or better than these devices.

Abstract This article presents a study conducted to analyze the effects of sequencing of questions in accounting examinations on student performance. The preparation of examinations, especially in accounting, requires a great deal of care if they are truly to reflect a student's mastery of the subject. Regardless of how much effort one puts into making up an examination, some students will nevertheless complain that it did not "fairly" measure their knowledge. Unfortunately, too little is known about the sequencing of examination questions and its effects on student performance to be able to say whether this complaint is justified. When examinations consist of questions that are not of equal difficulty, sources in the education literature recommend that they be arranged in order of increasing difficulty. This is considered desirable because it avoids the possibility of weaker students getting discouraged because of their inability to respond to difficult questions early in the test. The study was designed to test this notion involving 306 elementary accounting students enrolled at the University of Delaware, in the College of Business and Economics.

Abstract This article explains the rationale of controlling the risk of a type II error for substantive tests in auditing. The risk of attesting to a materially misstated amount is defined in one of two ways depending on the combination of decision strategy and sampling plan in use. When employing difference estimation, the auditor makes an interval estimate of the amount of error in an account balance. If the upper precision limit is less than the amount considered material, the book value is accepted. Here the risk to be controlled is one minus the confidence level employed, i.e., the probability of a Type I error. The more popular strategy, at least as far as textual treatments are concerned, involves making an interval estimate of the audited value of an account balance and accepting the book value if it falls within the interval. The audit examination is quite analogous to the quality control example. If an auditor accepts a book value only if it falls within his interval estimate of the "true" value, the adverse consequences of a Type I error are primarily the costs of extended audit procedures.

Abstract This article describes a generalized quantitative approach to the presentation of percentage-of-completion method for recognizing profit on long-term construction contracts. This method has two distinct advantages over the non-quantitative approach. First, the use of a programmable symbolic language permits the student to be appraised of the potential for determining profit on many contracts virtually instantaneously. Such an environment is realistic to many actual business situations. Second, this method permits attention to be focused on the conceptual aspects of the percentage-of-completion method and avoids the danger of centering attention on the arithmetic busy-work which is inherent in the non-quantitative approach. Essentially, the percentage-of-completion method is an attempt to recognize income in proportion to progress on a project for each year in which construction occurs. Relevant data for this calculation include estimated project life in years, contract price, expenditures in year i, and the estimated cost to complete the contract made in year i.