Obstacles to measuring professional skepticism in the local environment - an applied study on a sample of Iraqi audit offices

Abstract

The research aims to identify whether there are obstacles that can affect the measurement of the auditor's professional skepticism in the local environment. Despite the multiplicity of studies conducted by the scientific and professional bodies responsible for the auditing profession to study professional skepticism and the importance of its application in practice, the amount of professional skepticism was not measured quantitatively in most of these studies. Theoretical, based on books, research, and previous studies published in relevant periodicals and websites. The descriptive, quantitative, and analytical approach was employed in measuring the professional skepticism of auditors in the research sample companies. The two researchers reached a number of conclusions, the most important of which is that the rapid developments in the business environment have made Professional skepticism for auditors represents a major challenge for both audit firms and regulatory bodies, especially in areas that include important administrative provisions with great uncertainty in measurement. Therefore, it is expected that the number of these areas will increase in the future, which makes the process of applying an adequate level of professional skepticism in Audit procedures are more important, and in order to achieve the goal of the research, the researchers recommended the need to adopt mathematical measures to measure the level of performance Professional skepticism In order to help auditors fulfill their responsibility to express a neutral professional opinion, because users of all categories place their trust in this report.