Impression Management: The Case of Malaysian Financial Graphs

Authors

  • Azham Md. Ali Faculty of Accountancy Universiti Utara Malaysia, Malaysia
  • Ram Al Jaffri Saad Faculty of Accountancy Universiti Utara Malaysia, Malaysia

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.32890/ijms2006.13.2.2

Keywords:

Company Annual Reports, financial graphs, impression management, Malaysia

Abstract

This study investigates the use and abuse of graphs in the annual reports of 100 component stocks of the Kuala Lumpur Stock Exchange (KLSE) (now, Bursa Malaysia) Composite Index for the year 2001. It is found that 79% of companies use graphs and that 8.1 is the mean number of graphs per graphusing companies. The most commonly graphed financial variables are sales, profit, EPS and DPS. Column and bar graph types are more popular than line and pie graphs for both KFVs (Key Financial Variables) and non-KFVs. Column and bar graphs account for 98% of KFVs and 75% of all graphs. However, line and pie graphs are more likely found for the non-KFVs than the KFVs. Though there is widespread use of graphs by Malaysian companies, azailable evidence point to the direction that Malaysian companies are not quite sophisticated users of graphs as their counterparts in the western developed countries such as the United States and Britain. This is especially clear when it concerns impression management practices of selectivity and measurement distortion where the evidence is moderately supportive of studies overseas. This is perhaps expected considering the fact that the Malaysian stock market is not as strong as those in the United States and Britain.

 

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Published

06-12-2006

Issue

Vol. 13 No. 2 (2006): International Journal of Management Studies (IJMS) Vol. 13, No. 2 December 2006

Section

Articles

Research impact

Harvested 2026-09-08
2 citations, from Semantic Scholar — the highest of the sources checked

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Identifiers DOI 10.32890/ijms2006.13.2.2 OpenAlex W1598851090 Semantic Scholar CorpusID 166685815