RELIANCE ON DECISION AIDS - AN EXAMINATION OF AUDITORS ASSESSMENT OF MANAGEMENT FRAUD

The assessment of management fraud risk is a complex decision process, but one with which few auditors have had experience. As a result, dec ision aids have been suggested to support this process. Unfortunately, many times users do not rely on decision aids even when doing so woul d improve the quality of the decision. This paper reports on an experi ment that examines the use of an expert system decision aid created to enhance the engagement of the user and increase reliance on the aid. Auditors using the expert system exhibited the ability to better discr iminate between situations with varying levels of management fraud ris k and selected more consistent subsequent decisions regarding appropri ate audit actions than did users of a decision aid that provided only a suggested assessment, a legit statistical model. The legit model use rs did discriminate better than both checklist users and unaided decis ion makers.