Finding accounting research

ICAEW has a long history of supporting and funding research of interest to the accountancy profession and the wider business community, often through its charitable trusts. As well as providing grants in aid of particular research projects, the Institute has worked to establish vital infrastructure for the production and communication of research in accounting and related fields — as exemplified by the creation of the PD Leake Professorship of Finance and Accounting in 1954, and the founding of the Accounting and Business Research (ABR) journal in 1970.

Today, the Institute continues to take steps in support of this aim. It remains committed to furthering the development of knowledge and understanding across its areas of interest, both through the funding of research projects on key areas of thought leadership, and by facilitating the dissemination and preservation of research outputs. Here, the ICAEW Library plays a key role, collecting and providing access to an extensive range of research publications running from the early days of the profession up to the present.

This guide provides a high-level overview of the full range of scholarly research outputs — both ICAEW-funded and otherwise — which are accessible through the Library. If you wish to browse the most recent academic research reports funded by the Institute's charitable trusts, please follow the link below:

• Browse the latest academic research reports funded by ICAEW's charitable trusts

ICAEW's Digital Archive contains a number of research reports and briefings which were produced with the help of a grant from the Institute’s charitable trusts. These publications are publicly accessible via the link below:

• Browse archived research outputs funded by ICAEW's charitable trusts

To refine the list of results by contributor, date, or subject, use the facets that appear on the left-hand side of the screen. Alternatively, click on the '+FILTER' button to filter by title, date, ICAEW department, or file name.

One of the key sites of publication for research papers on accounting and related topics is Accounting and Business Research (ABR), a journal established by ICAEW in 1970. The Institute published the journal until 2002; it was subsequently published by Wolters Kluwer / CCH until 2011, when it was taken on by its present publisher, Taylor & Francis.

ABR has consistently maintained an association with ICAEW, and has published many papers supported and/or funded by the Institute. In its first few decades the journal produced a number of special issues in collaboration with ICAEW — in 1993 the Institute’s Research Board financed a special issue on corporate governance, for instance. More recently, ABR began publishing ICAEW's PD Leake lectures and the papers presented at its annual Information for Better Markets (IFBM) conferences, both funded by the Institute’s charitable trusts. Since 2006 the latter have been published in an annual International Accounting Policy Forum special issue. Further information on the history of the journal can be found in a number of articles held in the Library collection.

The ICAEW Library holds a complete reference collection of print editions of ABR from 1970 to the end of 2022, along with later International Accounting Policy Forum special issues. You can request a full-text copy of a particular article through our document supply service. Abstracts of articles published in the journal may be browsed via the following links:

• Browse abstracts on the Taylor & Francis website
• Browse abstracts on the Library catalogue (selected articles only)

In addition to ABR, the Library collection includes a number of other academic journals containing research papers on accounting and related topics. Some of these titles are being collected on an ongoing basis; others are archived. A selection of these print journals is set out below, along with links to abstracts of particular articles. You can request a full-text copy of an article held in our collection through our document supply service.

The following academic journals are currently being collected by the Library:

To browse the Library’s full collection of print journals, search the Library catalogue or see our journals pages.

As well as its extensive range of academic journals, the Library holds a large print collection of ‘standalone’ research papers, reports, theses and books. Some of these were published and/or funded by ICAEW; others were not.

It should be noted that, over the years, ICAEW has published standalone research outputs under various different 'imprints'. Academic research published by the Institute in recent years is simply marked ‘ICAEW Charitable Trusts’; past imprints include the ‘ICAEW Centre for Business Performance’ and the ‘ICAEW Centre for Business Research’.

As a starting point, the Library's print collection of standalone research outputs (not all of which are strictly 'scholarly') may be browsed by topic via the following links:

• Accounting
• Audit and assurance
• Corporate finance
• Corporate governance
• Financial management
• Sustainability
• Taxation
• Technology

To create more specific searches tailored to your particular interests, you may search the Library catalogue yourself — see our LibCat help page for guidance.

ICAEW members, ACA students and other entitled users have direct access to a large amount of scholarly material — both journal articles and eBooks — via the following online databases.

The Business Source Corporate Plus database from EBSCO contains a large number of scholarly articles on accounting and related topics, drawn from a vast array of academic journals. The database is accessible to logged-in ICAEW members, ACA students and other entitled users.

Information on how to search and browse the database can be found on our dedicated Business Source Corporate page. For curated selections of the online journals contained within it, see our journals pages.

Latest articles

To view topic-based listings of the latest academic articles available via Business Source Corporate Plus, please log in.

Three more online journals containing research papers on accounting, auditing, business and related topics are accessible to logged-in members, ACA students and other entitled users via the Emerald Insight database.

To view these titles and browse and search the articles available in each, please log in.

A small selection of scholarly eBook titles — both monographs and edited volumes — are available to ICAEW members and ACA students via the ProQuest Ebook Central platform. For more information, and to browse and search the available titles, please see our Ebook Central page.

In the pre-digital age, one of the most common ways to locate academic research on accounting and finance was to consult the print indexes of journal article abstracts published by Anbar from the early 1960s until 2000, and subsequently by Emerald from 2001 to 2006. The volumes for accounting and finance were published in association with ICAEW.

These volumes may be helpful if you are seeking to identify older research papers. The Library holds the following Anbar and Emerald indexes containing accounting and finance abstracts for the period 1972 to 2006:

• Anbar Yearbook (1972-1993)
• Anbar Accounting and Finance Abstracts (1994-1997)
• Anbar Management Abstracts (1998-2000)
• Emerald Management Reviews (2001-2006)

In addition to the above, the Library also holds many other volumes containing abstracts on accounting, finance and management, running from the 1960s up to the 2000s.

Further information on ICAEW's support for academic research can be found on the following pages:

• Academic research funding and reports
• Apply for research project funding