A review of the Audit Judgment Symposium: 1983-1992; Discussion

The nature and extent of the USC-Deloitte & Touche Audit Judgment Symposium's (AJS) contributions to auditing and audit judgment research are reviewed. The research methods include historical assessment, content analysis of presented papers, and the development of a taxonomy for identifying and assessing research issues, research methods, and related issues. It is concluded that the AJS has met or exceeded the goals set by the organizers of the symposium. The level of interaction and cross-fertilization of research ideas and endeavors has been very fruitful. In a discussion paper, Edwards notes that the cognitive illusions familiar from behavioral decision theory research affect auditors as well as students, but auditors are better at minimizing the impact of those effects than are student subjects. The Mock and colleagues paper did not address this in detail.