The effect of COVID-19 on audit quality during social distancing

The high rate of outbreaks of the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (QUID-19) is a warning about health, economic, and social issues that are affecting the whole world. The COVID-19 pandemic has had many financial and economic implications worldwide. These economic turbulences, along with market uncertainty, can affect investors' confidence in firms' financial performance and, consequently, may lead to various financial crises. Audit quality can affect the auditors' ability to detect material misstatements. This study is conducted to investigate the effect of COVID-19 on audit quality during social distancing in companies listed on the Tehran Stock Exchange. This is an applied study in terms of purpose and a descriptive-comparative one in terms of method. In the study, one main hypothesis and five sub-hypotheses were developed, and the Kruskal-Wallis test with SPSS software was used. The statistical population included companies listed on the Tehran Stock Exchange from 2017 to 2020. The findings suggest that COVID-19 affects audit quality during social distancing in companies listed on the Tehran Stock Exchange.