Myths on Internal Auditing

The myths on internal auditing feed on a combination of facts, beliefs, and rumours, like it usually happens when people seek to comprehend things that are somewhat puzzling to the eye of a layman. The author of the article investigates the sourcesand content of internal auditing myths to explain why these cognitive constructs should be identified and counteracted. The aim of the article is to present the myths oninternal audit. The analysis is based on research involving a critical review of the literature and unstructured interviews with 6 internal auditors, 7 auditees and 4 working students. The author decided to explore internal audit myths after analysing the results of a survey conducted in preparation of her doctoral dissertation. The analysis revealed ungrounded beliefs about this function, as well as showing that internal audit myths are circulated by auditees, working students and internal auditors themselves. A failure to find studies on internal audit myths was also an argument for undertaking the following research. This research is part of a larger project on internal audit education, which has been kindly supported financially by the Polish Ministry of Science and Higher Education through Young Researchers funding, contract no. B 1812100001865.02.