Effects of Translation on Probability Judgments: Evidence from the IFRS in Taiwan

Abstract

Following the trend toward a globalized accounting standard, many non-English-speaking countries have adopted the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS). Translation of the IFRS from English to other languages is inevitable; thus, it is crucial to ensure that the original meanings of the standard requirements are not affected by translation. Using accounting students from a university in Taiwan as participants, we found that nearly half of probability expressions from the IFRS were differently interpreted before and after translation. And the effects of translation were moderated by the participants' accounting knowledge and English proficiency. Our results show that improving participants' accounting knowledge or English fluency would reduce variations in interpretations of probability expressions before and after the translation. Finally, we found that translation has more impact on participants' interpretations of negative expressions than positive expressions.