audit task complexity

Audit effort as a measure of audit quality has taken an important part of audit research. In explaining the factors affecting it, the audit task complexity is one of the factors that plays an important role. Therefore, the purpose of this research is to investigate the effect of audit task complexity on audit effort. In this regard, the information related to 119 companies admitted to the Tehran Stock Exchange during the years 2011 to 2020has been collected, and by presenting a new model of measuring audit task complexity work, its effect on audit effort was tested through composite data using a panel method. The research findings have shown that the audit task complexity has positive effect on audit effort. These findings can be beneficial for audit institutions in terms of planning and allocating audit resources as well as determining audit fees. In addition, the findings can help to increase the effectiveness and efficiency and ultimately the quality of the audit.

Audit task complexity, as one of the important and effective factors on the auditors' judgment and decision-making, is one of the controversial concepts in the audit field, which, due to its multidimensional nature, has led to many researches in the audit field. Despite the provision of individual indicators to measure audit task complexity in these studies, explaining a multidimensional model to measure of this fundamental concept in auditing is a problem that requires to research. It is expected that the explanation of such an index can lead to a better understanding of this concept and its dimensions and help auditors in planning audit task as well as ways to increase the quality of judgment and decision making. Accordingly, the current research purpose is to explain a model to measure for audit task complexity concept. For this purpose, information related to 128 companies in Tehran Stock Exchange during 2010-2019 was collected and tested through Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling. Findings based on Constructive-Constructive measurement model and second-order Confirmatory Factor analysis showed that twenty-one factors effect on audit task complexity. Also, the results showed that audit task complexity is influenced by three dimensions of input, processing and output complexity. These findings, in addition to explaining the concept of audit task complexity, have helped to understand the effective factors and dimensions of this concept and can be useful in auditor's tasks planning and policy making and provide a more powerful tool to increase audit judgment quality.