Accountants' professional commitment, rule observance and culture: an empirical approach

This study investigates the relationship between professional commitment, rule observance and cultural dimensions. It extends prior research, and the results support the Hofstede cultural theory. Analysis and results involving 264 accountant professionals from both Australia and Egypt revealed that for Egypt the scores for power distance, uncertainty avoidance, masculinity and long term is higher than for Australia, while the individualism was lower. Professional commitment and rules observance were higher in Egypt than in Australia. Finally, it was found that professionalism was positively related to long term in Egypt and negatively related to power distance in Australia. Long tem, power distance, masculinity and uncertainty avoidance were found to be significant single predictors of the professional commitment and rule observance in both Egypt and Australia.