Journal of Accounting Research Vol. 62 No. 5 2024
Global Evolution of Environmental and Social Disclosure in Annual Reports
Abstract
We study environmental and social (E&S) disclosures in annual reports. Using the word embedding model to examine over 210,000 annual reports from 24,271 public firms in 30 international countries/regions between 2001 and 2020, we create an E&S dictionary that allows us to document trends in annual report E&S disclosure. Specifically, we find: (1) increases in length and boilerplate language and (2) decreases in specificity. Our results also suggest that E&S disclosure quality improves after the adoption of voluntary ESG reporting frameworks but deteriorates after disclosure mandates. Our findings provide systematic evidence on the evolution of E&S disclosure in annual reports over the past two decades and shed light on how voluntary and mandatory standards have shaped global E&S reporting practices.
- DOI
- 10.1111/1475-679x.12575
- Volume
- 62
- Issue
- 5
- Pages
- 1941-1988
- Language
- en
- Sources
- bibtex:phds-export.bib openalex crossref