Financial Reporting Qualitative Interview Based Research: A Primer with an Illustrative Example

Responding to increased calls for financial reporting researchers to “enter the field”, the goal of this article is to provide a basic primer on how to conduct field-based research using qualitative interview methods. We start by reviewing the extant, but limited, field research literature in financial reporting. We then assemble a set of resources that facilitate transfer of explicit (also known as declarative, codified or “textbook”) knowledge about the interview method. Next, following knowledge transfer theory we attempt to bridge the “knowing-doing gap” by reviewing how we carried out a study on earnings press release creation process. This example driven approach allows us to not only illustrate how explicit knowledge of interview-methods can be applied, but also provides a means to highlight the tacit knowledge about implementation issues and choices. By following the advice in this article, novice field researchers in financial reporting will gain a basic fluency in qualitative interview-based methods that will enable them to more readily acquire the knowledge and skills to respond to the challenge of going into the field and conducting valid, reliable, field based financial reporting research.