Influence of Professional Ethics and Standards in Less Developed Countries: An Assessment of Professional Accountants in Nigeria

Recently, there has been growing concern about ethical and integrity issues in the accounting and auditing profession in public and private sectors of the economy, based on questionable acts committed by professionals whose certification decision makers rely upon. This study adopted the stewardship theory as a theoretical background to develop an empirical framework for examining the influence of ethical professional standards on financial reporting practices in less developed countries. The result of this study however, shows that there is a low degree of adoption. The most prevalent of these factors are greediness and self-interest of the accountant while the least factor is lack of will to sanction violations of clearly defined ethical codes of conduct. The paper recommends that strong enforcement mechanism including the establishment of peer review procedures and institutional monitoring to regulate the activities of professional accountants and ensure strict enforcement of codes of professional practice.