Decision Making and Judgment Styles in Fair Value Estimation:The effect of the mental framework

Accounting is at the core of the judgment and decision making of individuals such as investors, managers and auditors. Judgment in accounting is generally the prediction of a future situation or the estimation of the present and ambiguous situation of an event. Fair value is one of the measurement bases that provides information for the judgment and decision making of users. Behavioral finance research has shown that decision making styles in individuals' mindsets can influence their estimates. The present study investigates the relationship between decision making styles and fair value judgments. A sample of 356 accountants and financial managers of stock companies and auditors of audit firms was selected by non-probability sampling method to achieve the research objectives. Questionnaire was used for data collection and Cronbach's alpha was used to assess the reliability of the questionnaire. Finally, structural equation modeling approach was used to test research hypotheses. The results of descriptive statistics showed that rational decision making, dependency decision making and avoidance decision making have a significant relationship with fair value estimation according to management whereas intuitive decision making and instant decision making have no significant relationship with fair value judgment judgments by management. In addition, the relationship between rational decision variables, dependency decision making, and avoidance decision making with judgment in fair value estimation based on similar items was confirmed. However, the relationship between intuitive decision variables and instant decision making with judgments of fair value estimates based on similar items was not confirmed.