【正文】 020) a A significant decrease in the market price of a longlived asset (asset group) b A significant adverse change in the extent or manner in which a longlived asset (asset group) is being used or in its physical condition c A significant adverse change in legal factors or in the business climate that could affect the value of a longlived asset (asset group), including an adverse action or assessment by a regulator d An accumulation of costs significantly in excess of the amount originally expected for the acquisition or construction of a longlived asset (asset group) e A currentperiod operating or cash flow loss bined with a history of operating or cash flow losses or a projection or forecast that demonstrates continuing losses associated with the use of a longlived asset (asset group) F A current expectation that, more likely than not, a longlived asset (asset group) will be sold or otherwise disposed of significantly before the end of its previously estimated useful life. Identifying the presence of impairment indicators is critical to the recognition of asset the accountant determines that an indicator is present, no further action will be taken. To plicate matters, some impairment indicators may be unfamiliar to the accountant because they are nonfinancial in nature and may e from sources external to the accounting organization. As a result, this step relies heavily on the judgment of the accountant, whic h may be biased. This study focuses on this step in the decisionmaking process. The remaining two steps of the asset impairment process are as follows. If the accountant determines that one or more impairment indicators are present, the accountant then conducts a recoverability test. This test involves forecasting the future cash flows expected to be generated by the asset and paring the sum of the undiscounted future cash flows with the carrying amount of the asset. If the undiscounted future cash flows will not recover the carrying amount of the asset, the asset is considered to be final step in the process is to measure the amount of the impairment loss and reduce the carrying amount of the asset to its fair value. Like the first step in the process, each of these steps relies heavily on the potentially biased judgment of the accountant. LITERATURE REVIEW AND DEVELOPMENT OF RESEARCH QUESTION AND HYPOTHESIS The idea that prior involvement in an investment decision could affect subsequent judgments made by a decision maker was explored by Brown and Solomon (1987). In a study examining the effects of oute information on evaluations of managerial decisions (specifically, a decision made by a capital budgeting mittee), Brown and Solomon found that evaluations made by subjects who had prior involvement in the mittee39。 Guastello, 1984。 Kaplan, 1996). These manipulations generally require subjects in the involvement or personal responsibility condition to make an initial decision as well as a second decision which all subjects make. The manipulation in this study required subjects in the involvement condition to prepare a remendation to the capital budgeting mittee immediately after reading the case materials describing the proposed investment in the plex. Subjects in the no involvement condition were not asked to advise the mittee on the investment decision. The involvement manipulation in this study was intended to force subjects to make a mitment to the project prior to considering any information about asset impairment. The accountability variable consists of two levels: accountability and no accountability for their decisions. The variable was operationalized by having subjects in the accountability condition justify their probability estimates. This type of manipulation is mon in the accountability literature as noted by Arnold (1997). Subjects were randomly assigned to one of four experimental groups: (1) a control group which did not make an investment remendation nor provide justifications for the probability assessments, (2) an involvement group which make an investment remendation prior to assessing the probability that the asset was impaired but did not justify their probability assessments, (3) an accountability group which justified (in writing) their probability assessments but did not make an investment remendation, and(4) an involvement/accountability group which made an investment remendation and justified (in writing) their probability assessments. The dependent variable in the study is the estimated probability of asset impairment. The dependent variable is measured five times (., once for each year of data)。s position such that one resists change in response to new information, but at some point, consistently favorable or unfavorable new information will lead to a catastrophic change in attitude. Empirical support for the CTA can be found not only in Latane and Nowak (1994) but also in Harton (1998), Harton and Latane (1997), and Liu and Latane (1995). Furthermore, the theory has been shown to be consistent with the contentions of other psychological theories including cognitive dissonance theory (Festinger, 1957), information integration theory (Anderson, 1981), thought polarization (Tesser,1976), and the elaborationlikelihood model (Petty and Cacioppo, 1986). This study considers whether CTA is useful in explaining the behavior of subjects in this , this study examines the following research question: R1: Will individuals who provide investment remendations exhibit hystersis in their subsequent assessments of the probability that an asset is impaired? Given that a major decision, such as an asset impairment decision, would be reviewed by external auditors, the impact of justification (a form of accountability) on the asset impairment decision is also examine