HOW DO ETHICS INFLUENCE BEHAVIOR OF ACCOUNTING PROFESSIONALS IN THEIR FIRMS’ ENVIRONMENT?

Abstract

After the Enron scandal about manipulation of financial statement is revealed in 2002, the auditor of Enron (Arthur Andersen) is collapsed because Arthur Andersen was found guilty of illegally destroying documents. It means that Arthur Andersen is doing unethical behavior. Therefore, the ethical behavior in accounting profession is very important. This research aimed to analyze the influence of roles, public interest, and organizational fit on accounting professionals’ perceptions toward ethical behavior by ethical environment. The sample used in this research is public accountant in Indonesia. The researcher uses questionnaire to gather the data. The sample of this research is external auditor. This research used 101 respondents. The statistical method used is Structural Equation Model – Partial Least Square (SEM-PLS) with WarpPLS software. The result of this research indicates that role, public interest and organizational fit are significantly related to ethical environment. In addition, ethical environment is mediation between role and public interest to ethical behavior, but is not mediation between organizational fit to ethical behavior.