THE PERCEPTION OF THE FINANCIAL REPORTING AND ACCOUNTING PROFESSION IN DIFFERENT CULTURAL ENVIRONMENTS: COMPARISON OF THE CZECH REPUBLIC, THE CHINA REPUBLIC, GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND

The process of IFRS (International Financial Reporting Standards) implementation started by the EU Decree 1609/2002 since 2005 has to face many obstacles and cultural influences. The transnational rules acquire specific national features and cultural specifics. Cultural specifics are usually reflected in the formulation of legislative rules and regulations. The analyses and detection of these differences are performed by many researchers. However, with much greater intensity the specifics operate in everyday practice, lying in the mind of people, in the daily decision making. This second form of national specifics does not exist in the written form and cannot be found in the wording of legal regulations. It exists in the mind of people, in the usual way of decision and assessment of the various situations. We supposed that this form of national specifics affects the supranational rules and its use to a greater extent. This became an incentive for our research. The aim of our research is to find out if there are any differences in the perception of the financial reporting and the role of accountants in three different environments: in the Czech Republic, in the Great Britain and Ireland and in the China Republic as representatives of three different accounting models: Continental, Anglo-Saxon and Asian. To find out if there are any differences in the views and attitudes to the solution of selected situations as a part of financial reporting has become an impetus for the first phase of our research (Kubickova, Nulicek, 2018). In this phase, we want to find out if there are greater differences between China compared to the Czech or the Anglo-Saxon ways of thinking. To achieve this goal we used the method of a questionnaire survey which included a set of questions and situations. The respondents were the students' groups of the university first-year students, the first one from the China Republic, the second one from the Czech Republic, the third one from Great Britain and Ireland. All the groups included students at the beginning of their university studies, having passed mostly the comprehensive secondary school, coming from larger cities and lower and middle classes. The responses obtained were statistically evaluated and the consistency or difference of responses was assessed by the F-test. The results confirmed our hypothesis that there are some differences in the students' opinions. We found that there are differences both in the opinions on the role of accountants in business management and on the role of financial reporting as well as in the attitudes to the solution of selected accounting situations. Greater differences were found among the views of continental and AngloSaxon students than between them and the Asian students. These findings have many limitations. The greater one lies in the extent of the set of respondents and their representativeness. However, they are indicative and can be used as a base for further research.