The Empirical Research Framework in Management Accounting

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the features of the empirical research in management accounting. Recently, in Japan, empirical research in accounting has been on the rise, and this tendency is prominent in management accounting. In empirical research, we test the hypotheses formulated under various themes through statistical verification of archival data. The accumulation of evidence plays a key role in the research and practice of management accounting. However, empirical research has limitations, such as bias in hypothesis formulation, subjectivity of the specification of variables, selection of empirical models, and interpretation of empirical results. In order to solve these problems, we need collaboration between empirical researches method and other expected research methods.