The impact of ethics education and religiosity on the cognitive moral development of senior accounting and business students in higher education

Ethical behavior is important in any profession, but it is extremely important in the accounting profession. Over the years, researchers have performed numerous studies in the field of ethics in relation to the accounting profession. The purpose of these studies is to determine the factors that might affect ethical reasoning abilities. With this improved understanding, the accounting profession may be able to control and improve the ethical orientation of the profession.;This study presents the results of an examination of the possible impact of ethics education and religiosity on moral reasoning of college students. Previous research on these two variables has provided mixed results. This study examined seniors at three universities in the mid-south region of the United States. Two of the universities were private and religiously affiliated and one was a public, secular university. The seniors included accounting majors and other business majors. This study measured ethics with the DIT-2 instrument, ethical education with completed ethics courses, and religiosity through university affiliation, individual affiliation, and commitment.;Results indicated neither ethical education nor the different aspects of religiosity to have an impact on the cognitive moral reasoning of the accounting or other business students. Accounting majors reported significantly higher moral scores than the other business majors' at all three universities. Students from one of the religious universities reported significantly higher moral scores than the other two universities. However, this study did not find ethical training or any aspect of religion as measured in this study to be a factor in these higher moral scores. These findings support the need for further research into determining factors of improved moral awareness.