The influence of board characteristics on sustainability reporting Empirical evidence from Sri Lankan firms

Purpose - Drawing on agency theory and legitimacy theory perspectives, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the influence of board characteristics on sustainability reporting of listed companies in the Colombo Stock Exchange (CSE), Sri Lanka. Design/methodology/approach - A sample of 148 list...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Mohamed, S., Junaid, M., Ho, Poh-Ling, Krishnan, Anbalagan
Format: Journal Article
Published: Emerald Group Publishing Limited 2014
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/62083
Description
Summary:Purpose - Drawing on agency theory and legitimacy theory perspectives, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the influence of board characteristics on sustainability reporting of listed companies in the Colombo Stock Exchange (CSE), Sri Lanka. Design/methodology/approach - A sample of 148 listed companies was drawn from the CSE using stratified random sampling method and data were collected from the 2012 annual reports. The proposed hypotheses were tested using a hierarchical binary logistic regression. Findings - This study documents that board size and dual leadership are positively associated with sustainability reporting and boards with female directors are negatively associated with sustainability reporting. This study also found that sustainability reporting is likely to be influenced by firm size and firm growth. Additionally, the study also reveals that younger firms are likely to adopt sustainability reporting.