An examination of the effect of subject specialisation, culture and prior education on computer ethics

Abstract

Ethics is currently an issue of considerable importance to accountants, and there have been calls from the accounting profession for greater attention to be paid to this topic. The paper reports on a study which examined the ethical perceptions of accounting and computer science students. The research also compared the perceptions of a New Zealand group with those of an international group (mainly composed of Malaysians), and examined the effect on interviewees’ perceptions of previous education, or lack of it, on the topic of computer ethics. There were significant differences particularly between accounting and computing students, and between New Zealand and Malaysian students.