The effect of audit committee characteristics on intellectual capital disclosure

Abstract

This paper, using data from 100 UK listed firms, investigates the relationship between audit committee characteristics and intellectual capital (IC) disclosure. We find that overall IC disclosure is positively associated with audit committee characteristics such as the size and frequency of meetings, and negatively associated with audit committee directors’ shareholding. We find no significant relationship between IC disclosure and audit committee independence and financial expertise. We also observe that the association between audit committee characteristics and IC disclosure varies with the IC components (i.e. human capital, structural capital and relational capital), suggesting that the underlying factors that drive various components of IC disclosure are different. These results have important implications for policy-makers in that they confirm that the effectiveness of audit committees in the corporate reporting processes is a function of certain characteristics.