The purpose of this study is to describe and analyze how auditors are affected by quality controls and if audit practice changes because of quality controls. To fulfill the purpose of this study there has been interviews made with five auditors. The conclusion by this study is that the interviewed auditors work practices are affected by quality controls and that the extent and effect depends on the auditor and the office that the auditor works in. The auditors who worked as quality reviewers at the agencies where they are employed at, we felt that they were more secured in the response towards quality controls. This may be because they are quality reviewers themselves and they know what the quality control requires and what must be met to be approved. One of the key elements of a quality control is feedback and suggestions for improving the next audit. This seems to be appreciated by all auditors and an important tool to help the auditors evolve in the profession. The majority of the auditors believe that mandatory education is one of the most important steps into keeping themselves updated on new standards. To summarize the result of the study we conclude that quality controls can affect the audit practice, but this comes to expression in different ways depending on the auditors experiences of quality control and what agency the auditor work in.

This qualitative study was aimed at developing an understanding of how persons involved in the investigation or deliberation of child abuse and neglect cases think and feel about the process of weighing evidence and drawing conclusions from it. Twenty investigators, supervisors, and administrators employed by the Child Protective Services agency in Texas were asked to describe cases they had investigated or reviewed that had been particularly difficult because of conflicting or ambiguous evidence. They were also asked opinion questions about the agency's actuarial risk assessment instrument and the concept of preponderance of evidence. Finally, participants were asked to respond to two short case vignettes describing allegations of sexual abuse. Constant comparative and narrative analysis of interview data revealed that the process of case deliberation in CPS makes use of both intuitive and analytic decision-making styles, and there is a general movement from intuition to analysis as a case ascends the decision-making hierarchy. This movement entails a shift from narrative forms of thought and an outcome-oriented ethic to analytic forms of thought and a rule-based ethic. Though intuitive decision making is at least partly guided from personal experience and personal values, and does produce error because of that, it is nonetheless a form of rationality as capable of being guided by scrupulousness and fidelity to truth as analysis is. The personal value and outcome-oriented ethic that intuition brings to the decision making process not only cannot be eliminated, it is necessary to the program's achievement of its mission. It is recommended that the training of new investigators should, first, acknowledge the large role that intuitive thinking plays in CPS decision making and, second, develop ways to help decision makers discipline intuition, in the words of one participant, and to create conditions that foster its optimal functioning.

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In this thesis, I examine how auditors construct their mental representations and test their hypotheses about the strength of a client’s control environment. With regard to the former, I hypothesize that management’s frame of the control system and auditor’s retrieval of control environment information from memory may influence the auditor’s control environment mental representation and impact subsequent audit judgments. Consistent with my theoretical predictions, I find that retrieval of control environment information from memory biases an auditor’s mental representation, and that this biased mental representation impacts subsequent fraud assessment. In addition, there is limited evidence to support the conjecture that auditors may be susceptible to management’s framing of the internal control system resulting in relatively positive control environment evaluations which was found to transfer to some subsequent audit judgments. With regard to the latter, prior audit literature has examined how auditors evaluate person specific characteristics, such as competence, of other auditors, however there has been no research that has examined how auditors test such characteristics of client management. I disentangle whether auditors utilize a diagnostic and/or a conservative hypothesis testing strategy when testing client management’s ethicality and competence as these are fundamental components of the client’s control environment. A diagnostic testing strategy is evidenced by the auditor searching for the most informative information, whereas a conservative testing strategy is evidenced by the auditor searching for risks. I examine how a checklist decision aid contained in the current institutional context may inhibit auditors’ utilization of a diagnostic testing strategy, and examine how a schematic decision aid is able to enhance diagnostic testing. The results indicate that auditors utilize both diagnostic and conservative testing strategies when testing client management ethicality; however, the auditor’s testing strategy is only diagnostic when testing client management competence. In regard to decision aids, I found that when testing client management ethicality and competence, a schematic decision aid was able to increase the auditor’s extent of diagnostic testing. The checklist decision aid decreased the auditor’s extent of diagnostic testing only when testing client management ethicality, and was not different from unaided judgments when testing client management competence. / Thesis (Ph.D, Management) -- Queen's University, 2011-02-22 13:43:07.232

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Mémoire numérisé par la Division de la gestion de documents et des archives de l'Université de Montréal

Tidigare forskning har varit oenig gällande vad ett SJT (situational judgment test) mäter. Studiens syfte är att undersöka vad SJT mäter genom att korrelera SJT-poängen med poängen på personlighets- respektive begåvningstest. Ytterligare en frågeställning är huruvida SJT skulle kunna vara ett användbart komplement till övriga arbetspsykologiska test. Totalt genomförde 130 personer fyra olika test; ett SJT, ett personlighetstest samt två begåvningstest (ett logiskt och ett matematiskt test). Resultatet av en regressionsanalys, med poängen på conscientiousness, agreeableness och g-faktorn som prediktorer av SJT-poäng, gav R = .31 och Adj R2 = .07. I linje med ett flertal andra studier blev conscientiousness och g-faktorn signifikanta prediktorer till SJT. Ytterligare studier krävs dock för att bekräfta vilket konstrukt SJT faktiskt mäter.

This Master of Laws thesis provides an analysis of Manitoba Court of Queen's Bench civil money judgment cases, sampled quantitatively for 1995 and 2004, to examine the length of time from the filing of a claim to judgment being issued, before and after the implementation of Manitoba Queen s Bench Rule 20A. The historical roots of Manitoba court procedure and certain enforcement processes are examined to explain historically: if you get the judgment, how do you get the money? The procedural law is rooted in the English medieval common law system of judicial writs, most recently made more efficient by Manitoba Queen s Bench Rule 20A. This remains basic to issues of law reform for all common law jurisdictions, including Saskatchewan s Enforcement of Money Judgments Act, and this thesis concludes with a set of qualitative recommendations.

This thesis investigated the influence of mindset on the accuracy and bias of relationship evaluations. Because deliberation about important decisions is a time when people are more realistic and impartial in processing information about themselves and the world, a deliberative mindset was expected to increase the predictive accuracy of relationship appraisals compared to an implemental mindset. Four studies using different methodologies tested this hypothesis. In Study 1, relationship mindset assessed via content coding interacted with commitment in predicting the survival of the relationship 4 months later. In Study 2, mindset assessed via closed questions about academic goals interacted with explicit forecasts in predicting the survival of the relationship 9 months later. In studies 3 and 4, an experimental manipulation of mindset interacted with explicit forecasts or relationship assessments of relationship constructs in predicting relationship survival 6 months later. Overall, a deliberative mindset increased the accuracy of relationship predictions and the validity of relationship constructs in predicting the dissolution of a relationship compared to an implemental mindset. Importantly, deliberatives were not more pessimistic than were implementals; they were more realistic. Nonetheless, a deliberative mindset about an important goal in the relationship can be threatening. Previous work found that boosting perceptions of partner superiority is one way to cope with such threat (Gagne & Lydon, 2001, Study 1). Study 5 further showed that participants in a deliberative mindset boosted their perceptions of partner superiority only if they were sufficiently committed to their relationships. Those in an implemental mindset boosted their perceptions of partner superiority irrespective of their commitment level. In sum, a deliberative mindset about the relationship increases the accuracy of evaluations serving epistemic needs (i.e., relationship predictions) while n

The objective of this creative project is the creation of sculptures and paintings that make statements concerning judgment and its subsets, fault, blame, martyrdom, self-sacrifice, and absolution. The group of pieces shown at the Thesis Exhibition explores recurring themes and iconography within a historical context, while addressing issues in a contemporary social framework. Repetitive elements and images such as self-portraits, the pointing finger, and the heart, are set in the present, but layered with the iconography and history of Saint Sebastian. The techniques used to achieve these works are metal casting and fabrication, casting using a variety of materials, woodworking, and oil painting. These techniques, along with materials such as wood, steel, plaster, wax, and branches congeal to form a body of work that is conceptually harmonious. / Department of Art