Does Corporate Accountability Legislation Impact Ethical Policies, Climates, and Behavior?

Project Leaders: Chaitra Hardison and Brian Gifford

This project examines 1) how public and private firms have changed their ethics compliance policies in the wake of recent accounting scandals and the passage of the 2002 Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) and 2004 revisions to the Federal Sentencing Guidelines (FSG) for organizations; and 2) whether these changes have contributed to the development of more ethical organizational climates and behavior. We are currently conducting reviews of the institutional/organizational psychology and sociology literatures on the determinants of corporate malfeasance and ethical behavior. In the next phase of research we will conduct interviews with ethics compliance and human resources officers to determine the types of ethics policies that have been implemented in the wake of SOX and FSG. Finally, we will administer a survey to employees within these firms to determine whether specific types of policies affect perceptions of their organization's ethical climate and their coworkers' ethical behaviors.