The determinants and consequences of corporate social responsibility disclosure : the case of Jordan

Alkayed, HAM

Abstract

This study focuses on investigating the determinants and consequences of Corporate Social Responsibility Disclosure (CSRD) in Jordan. The study examines factors that influences CSR disclosure extent and quality, such as corporate characteristics (size, gearing, firm’s age, and industry type), corporate governance (board size, number of meetings, non-executive directors, female directors in the board, family directors in the board, foreign members, audit committee, type of external auditors, and CEO duality) and ownership structure (government ownership, institutional ownership, and ownership concentration). A quantitative approach is adopted for this research, and a content analysis technique is used to gather CSR disclosure extent and quality from the annual reports. The sample is withdrawn from the annual reports of 118 Jordanian companies over the period of 2010-2015. A CSRD index is constructed, and includes the disclosures of the following categories; environmental, human resources, product and consumers, and Community involvement. A 7 point-scale measurement was developed to examine the quality of disclosure. This study fills the gap in the literature regarding CSRD in Jordan, and the fact that all the previous studies have ignored charts and images as a measurement of quality. The result shows that the extent of CSRD is higher than the quality in Jordan. Regarding the determinates of CSR disclosures, the following factors were found to have a significant relationship with both extent and quality of CSRD except non-executives, which was only found significant with the extent of CSRD: board size, non-executive directors, firm’s age, foreign members on the board, number of boards meetings, the presence of audit committees, big 4, government ownership, firm’s size, industry type. With regard to CSRD consequences, the result shows that CSRD has a positive and significant impact on company performance (ROA) and market value. This result provides evidence for policy makers (Jordan security commission) of the importance of CSRD and its impact on company’s performance, and that companies should consider this type of disclosure more in their annual reports. They also have to consider introducing new laws that mandate CSR disclosures, since it has many advantages for the companies and society in general.

Citation

Alkayed, H. (in press). The determinants and consequences of corporate social responsibility disclosure : the case of Jordan. (Thesis). University of Salford

• Thesis Type: Thesis
• Acceptance Date: Jan 1, 2018
• Deposit Date: Feb 21, 2018
• Publicly Available Date: Feb 21, 2018