Emerging Technologies

What is Emerging Technologies?

The Emerging Technologies focus area emphasizes research, education and knowledge transfer, and interaction initiatives at UWCISA, particularly attuned to topics such as:

  • the implications of emerging technologies on financial reporting, audit processes, tax preparation, and compliance management, aiming to enhance accuracy, efficiency, and transparency,
  • the development of new accounting frameworks and standards to accommodate the integration of emerging technologies, and
  • assessing the impact of emerging technologies on data security, privacy, and ethical considerations within the financial sector.

Led by

Theo Stratopoulos headshot

Theo Stratopoulos, PhD

UWCISA Associate Director Data Analytics and Emerging Technologies

Research

Thought Leadership, Funding Specific Research Projects

Current Emerging Technologies Research
Papers Details
Algorithm versus Human Managers: The Impact of Manager Type and Communication Frequency on Auditors' Underreporting Behavior
  • Research team: Tim Bauer, Samantha Seto, Jenny Ulla.
  • Objectives: To examine the impact of different approaches to managing audits, via new technology (algorithm vs. human manager) or management style (frequency of communication), on auditors’ time reporting.
  • Status: In process – seeking feedback via conference and workshop presentations.
  • Affiliation: This paper is co-led by Tim Bauer, an associate director of UWCISA.
Does Gamification of Crowdfunding Lead to Higher Success?
  • Research team: Theo Stratopoulos, Jonathan Hua Ye.
  • Objectives: To investigate the effect of adding a leaderboard of top donors (i.e., gamification) on the success rate of crowdfunding (i.e., amount raised/goal).
  • Status: Complete – this paper is forthcoming in Journal of Management Information Systems.
  • Affiliation: This paper is co-led by Theo Stratopoulos, an associate director of UWCISA.
Designing Contests for Data Science Competitions: Number of Stages and the Prize Structures
  • Research team: Keehyung Kim, Jialu Liu.
  • Objectives: To examine contest and prize structures within data science competitions to inform firms about how to best motivate innovative crowd solutions and effort from contestants.
  • Status: Complete – this paper was published in Production and Operations Management, Vol. 32, No. 11, 2023.
  • Affiliation: This paper is co-led by Keehyung Kim, a member of UWCISA.
Does Use of AI Tools Affect a Decision-making Behavior: An Experimental Study
  • Research team: Keehyung Kim, Yige Chen.
  • Objectives: To experimentally investigate how the source of information (AI vs. human experts) may affect decision-making behavior in various scenarios.
  • Status: In process – design of experiments and data collection ongoing.
  • Affiliation: This paper is co-led by Keehyung Kim, a member of UWCISA.
From VisiCalc to ChatGPT: Unraveling the Perfect Storm of Emerging Technologies and its Implications for the Accounting Profession
  • Research team: Theo Stratopoulos, Ivee Che, Yifei Kuang.
  • Objective: To explore the interconnectedness and evolution of emerging technologies and their profound implications for the accounting profession.
  • Status: In process – drafting working paper for feedback.
  • Affiliation: This paper is co-led by Theo Stratopoulos, an associate director of UWCISA.
The impact of anthropomorphism on users’ adoption of conversational agents’ recommendations
  • Research team: Sepideh Ebrahimi, Christian Matt, Izak Benbasat.
  • Objectives: To investigate whether the anthropomorphism of conversational agents impacts users’ perception of the quality of their recommendation and whether participants are likely to be more forgiving of low quality recommendations when they are given by anthropomorphized agents.
  • Status: In process – data analysis ongoing.
  • Affiliation: This paper is co-led by Sepideh Ebrahim, a member of UWCISA.
A meta-analysis of the factors influencing users' acceptance of conversational agents' advice
  • Research team: Sepideh Ebrahimi, Samira Farivar, Kamran Eshghi.
  • Objectives: To investigate the factors that influence people’s trust in conversational agents and adoption of their advice and examine whether meaningful differences exist in the impact of these factors across different fields (e.g., commerce, healthcare).
  • Status: In process – data analysis ongoing.
  • Affiliation: This paper is co-led by Sepideh Ebrahim, a member of UWCISA.
CPA Familiarity with Emerging Technologies and Tools
  • Research team: Tim Bauer, Efrim Boritz, Krista Fiolleau, Brad Pomeroy, Adam Vitalis.  
  • Objectives: To examine emerging technologies and tools (T&T's) CPAs encounter or use in practice, and which of these T&T's they most believe will have impact or are of interest in practice. These perspectives signal which T&T's have penetrated the CPA workplace the most and which ones require additional factors to be prominent aspects of the CPA profession.
  • Status: In process – being prepared for journal submission.
  • Affiliation: This project has received support from UWCISA.
A Scoping Review of ChatGPT Research in Accounting and Finance
  • Research team: Theo Stratopoulos, Victor Wang, Michael Dong.
  • Objective: To provide a review of recent publications and working papers on ChatGPT and related Large Language Models (LLMs) in accounting and finance, to help understand the current state of research in these two areas and identify potential research opportunities for future inquiry.
  • Status: In process – under review at a journal.
  • Affiliation: This paper is co-led by Theo Stratopoulos, an associate director of UWCISA.

Education and Knowledge Transfer

Disseminating Best Practices, Sharing Material (Workshops / Conferences)
Developing Courses, Workshops, Cases and Other Teaching Material

Courses and Programs

Access to Robotic Process Automation Tools

  • Theo Stratopoulos arranged an academic partnership with UiPath, the leading RPA software provider, to give SAF students access to the software and teaching material.

Master’s Research Paper

  • The MAcc Program at the University of Waterloo offers students the option to complete a Master's Research Paper (MRP) instead of a 4th elective course, over the 8 months (Jan-Aug) of the program.
  • In 2024, one student is completing an MRP in the emerging technologies area: Ella Koay, as supervised by Theo Stratopoulos.

Workshops

Prompt Engineering

  • Under the leadership of Malik Datardina and Efrim Boritz, UWCISA has developed a workshop on prompt engineering.
  • The first offering was in-person on June 3 and the second offering was online on July 29.
  • A third offering will be held online on October 30.

Amassing and Disseminating Knowledge

Large Language Models

  • Theo Stratopoulos and Victor Wang will be the guest editors of the International Journal of Accounting Information Systems for a special issue on Artificial Intelligence, with a focus on Large Language Models, in Accounting.
  • This special issue aims to explore the transformative impact of AI and LLMs on accounting practice and research. A call for papers was placed July 17, 2023 and the special issue will be published in 2025.

Practitioner Resources

Article on AI Technologies

Interaction

Engaging with Profession, Students, Public

Emerging Technologies Advisory Group

  • The aim of this initiative is to organize a team of industry experts and meet periodically to discuss/identify emerging technologies and how they will affect our curriculum.
  • Theo Stratopoulos is one of the co-team leaders of this initiative.