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Selected SASB materiality dimension according to correlation matrix results, with corresponding bigrams for λ = 1 and 0.3
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There is extant research on theorization, conceptualization, determinants, and consequences of corporate social responsibility (CSR). However, what firms include in their CSR or sustainability reports are much less covered and are predominantly covered in case studies of individual firms. In this paper, we instead take a holistic view and simultane...
Contexts in source publication
Context 1
... the one hand, we note that topics are well separated and the setting of the hyperparameters sensible. On the other hand, we extract the predominant bigrams per topic and list them in Table 2. For instance, topic 2 was highly correlated with the dimension Human Capital and we therefore expect the corresponding bigrams in Table 2 to pertain to human capital. ...Context 2
... the other hand, we extract the predominant bigrams per topic and list them in Table 2. For instance, topic 2 was highly correlated with the dimension Human Capital and we therefore expect the corresponding bigrams in Table 2 to pertain to human capital. Under this topic we note stemmed bigrams like "social respons", "human resourc", and "develop employe". ...Similar publications
Large corporations in the financial and technology sectors are increasingly interested in digital currencies, and central bank digital currencies are being actively researched around the globe. In this study, we analyzed the public discourse conducted through the social media platform Twitter concerning Facebook's Libra digital currency initiative....
Citations
... Studies have focused on aligning SRs with SASB and SDGs. Lindgren et al. (2021) Table 5 illustrates that advanced techniques such as supervised and unsupervised ML methods offer significant depth and breadth in analyzing SRs for compliance with various standards. These methods were applied to medium to large datasets, providing detailed compliance assessments with high accuracy. ...
... Advanced techniques like supervised and unsupervised ML (e.g., Neural networks, BERT, LDA, Word2Vec) offer a more in-depth and nuanced understanding of the text, capturing semantic relationships and providing detailed contextual analysis. These methods are particularly effective for uncovering complex patterns and compliance nuances, as seen in studies by Shahi et al. (2014) and Lindgren et al. (2021), which analyzed large datasets and provided detailed compliance assessments. ...
Automated text analysis approaches such as text mining (TM) and natural language processing (NLP) hold great promise for dealing with the growing volume, diversity, and complexity of the data found within corporate sustainability reports (SRs). However, given the novelty of these approaches, we know little about how and how well these research studies have utilized these new tools-specifically, the methods employed, research objectives addressed, and progress in applying these tools in a manner that would allow us to fully maximize the insights generated from the growing wealth of sustainability data. Consequently, we conduct a systematic literature review (SLR) in order to synthesize and assess the literature utilizing TM-NLP to study SRs. Our contribution is threefold: First, we provide an overview of the methodologies and techniques that have been employed in the analysis of SRs. Second, we review the research objectives pursued by scholars employing TM-NLP in the analysis of SRs. Third, based on these, we present a critical assessment of the literature to date. Findings reveal that while there has been some progress, issues related to research depth, breadth, and methodological transparency are evident in the body of literature to date. As such, we argue that the potential of TM-NLP to generate significant insights from SR big data remains largely unrealized and offer suggestions for future research.
... Stakeholder engagement, as an intended process for corporate accountability, could gradually over time be restricted due to certain stakeholder attributes such as their power, relation to other stakeholders, and the organization [73]. The lower stakeholder engagement ratings could also be supportive of Lindgren et al. (2020), in that companies adopting a stakeholder-focused reporting framework may not necessarily be stakeholder-oriented, instead focusing on shareholders still [74]. This business case approach, which focuses on shareholders, as opposed to a stakeholder-accountable approach, could eventually further strengthen existing power imbalances between corporations and society [75]. ...
This study examines how leading Thai companies implement materiality assessments and stakeholder engagements in their sustainability reporting. While the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) framework emphasizes these processes as being central to effective reporting, research on their concurrent implementation remains limited. Through a content analysis of GRI-aligned sustainability reports from top Thai firms, this study found that companies appear comprehensive in identifying material topics and stakeholders initially. However, a deeper analysis revealed primarily information-gathering approaches with stakeholders and limited disclosure of stakeholder impacts. Materiality assessments lacked clear information on how material issues affect both the organization and stakeholders. The findings indicate that materiality assessments are more rigorous than stakeholder engagement efforts in practice. This suggests that even when using stakeholder-focused standards like the GRI, actual stakeholder engagement may be superficial. Such superficial implementation of reporting standards potentially limits the ability of these standards to generate stakeholder engagement, which is an important pre-requisite for organizational transformation and accountability. This study contributes to understanding the practical application of these key reporting processes in an emerging market context. It highlights areas for improvement in corporate reporting practice and proposes directions for future research on enhancing the effectiveness of sustainability reporting.
... Sustainability information is useful for decision-making by both internal and external stakeholders, as it can help predicate a firm's overall risk and future benefits [20]. Intended users (i.e., stakeholders) of SR data usually include consumers, employees, suppliers, governments, communities, potential investors, and debt holders [21]. ...
This paper examines whether the adoption of the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) by listed firms could enhance the alignment between corporate sustainability reporting and stakeholders’ interests in China. Drawing on content analysis of the environmental, social, and governance (ESG) reports of 48 selected listed firms and a questionnaire survey of 409 respondents, this study shows that most of the sampled firms with GRI adoption have more sustainability activities identified in the content analysis than their peers that do not follow the GRI guidelines in the same industries; both groups of firms have a similar pattern of disclosure frequency in light of the six dimensions developed in this study; and there is a disconnect between the stakeholders’ needs and the sustainability reporting practice of the sampled listed firms. The findings reflect that the current corporate social responsibility reporting practice could be interpreted as a strategic response to the government’s policy priorities, rather than a direct attempt to address stakeholders’ concerns.
... Such refinements and improvements will open other avenues of research and may also have a moderating effect in strengthening accountability. Accountability may be strengthened, since stakeholders will obtain greater flexibility to evaluate firms' CSR disclosures, which are otherwise voluminous and use boiler-plate language (Lindgren, Huq, and Carling 2021), and rely on high-cost proprietary databases of CSR indices, where the classification process is not always transparent (Hummel and Schlick 2016). Past studies have shown different institutional factors influence firm disclosures differently (Hope 2003;Jaggi and Low 2000), and that the working language (used in the firm) affects disclosure behavior of firms differently to these institutional factors (Liang, Marquis, Renneboog, and Sun 2018). ...
We develop a novel and generic text-based measure to classify and evaluate greenhouse gas (GHG) disclosures. We construct the measure using collocation analysis of GHG-related words and regular expressions. Automated implementation achieved high concordance compared to manual investigations. We move beyond the “bag-of-words” approach in classifying voluminous nonfinancial corporate disclosure. We also outline a methodology that is manyfold scalable and makes replicability straightforward. Compared to past studies, we work with a significantly larger sample of 5,017 reports across 80 countries, thereby dealing with greater complexity and leading to better generalizability. We also contribute to the debate on whether nonfinancial disclosures exhibit accountability or are merely greenwashing. We find a negative trend in accountability worldwide, and firm-level accountability in GHG disclosures is not detectable in a country-level reduction of GHG emissions. Moreover, firms disclose significantly higher accountable information in a civil-law legal environment compared to those in a common-law legal environment.
JEL Classifications: M14; M40.
... We opt to base our coding scheme on the materiality map provided by the SASB. The SASB focuses on financially material issues that often matter the most to investors, and past studies have shown that an investor approach to determining materiality is also predominantly applied in nonfinancial reporting (Lindgren et al., 2021), primarily stemming from the long tradition of such a focus in financial reporting (Brown and Dillard, 2015;Harrison and Smith, 2015;Mitchell et al., 2015;Zeff, 1978). Past studies have also shown that investors value such information (Khan et al., 2016). ...
... This paper explored the use of eco-certification in public sustainability reporting, and connections between CSR strategies and the delivery of ecosystem services associated with salmon farming. Sustainability reporting is typically targeted towards shareholders [54], and thus this analysis is limited by what companies chose to disclose and include for this audience. ...
Aquaculture eco-certification is especially relevant in salmon farming where it has emerged as a popular corporate social responsibility (CSR) strategy, providing global standards that can be applied to a globally traded commodity. However, eco-certification is just one of many CSR strategies used to address seafood sustainability at the corporate level. CSR is important for company image, but it is not clear whether or how these strategies contribute to sustainability outcomes. This paper applies an ecosystem services framework to an analysis of sustainability reporting from top salmon farming companies to identify links between eco-certification, other CSR strategies, and the delivery of ecosystem services. Although eco-certification was used to indicate commitment to sustainability practices across all companies, other CSR strategies, especially practices, power, and partnership, were more frequently and explicitly connected to the delivery of ecosystem services. Results show that individual CSR strategies including eco-certification are not isolated but interact and work in concert to manage the supply of ecosystem services.
... The need for more CSR information is due to an increased interest from many stakeholders (e.g., companies, regulators, professionals, researchers, etc.). More precisely, CSR derives its importance from its widespread influence on many business aspects and reflection of firms' social and environmental impacts [1,2]. CSR disclosure (CSRD) has thus become a valuable source of such information, which demonstrates the critical role played by CSRD in decision-making for stakeholders [3][4][5]. ...
... In light of this gap in the existing literature, our primary objective is to explore the feasibility of applying deep learning approache to uncover CSRD patterns specific to Saudi Arabia. The overall aim is to propose a comprehensive framework capable of achieving three key objectives: (1) analyzing firms' characteristics (including traditional and country-specific factors) to gain a deeper understanding of the complex dynamics influencing CSRD in the Saudi Arabian context; (2) identifying relationships between variables to discover the intricate connections between firms' characteristics and their CSRD patterns; and (3) predicting the patterns of CSRD based on the identified relationships and firms' characteristics. ...
Corporate social responsibility (CSR) has gained a great deal of interest in recent years due to the need for information that can help many stakeholders (e.g., governments, investors, professional organizations, researchers, etc.) understand companies’ contributions to the environment and society. CSR disclosure (CSRD) is now the key source of such information when analyzing, for example, an institution’s future performance. In the current body of CSRD literature, the majority of quantitative CSRD studies have relied on traditional statistical approaches for the correlation analysis of CSRD influencing factors. In this paper, we intend to quantitatively analyze firms’ characteristics related to CSRD in Saudi Arabia, understand CSRD and its influencing factors, and predict CSRD patterns. This study lays the groundwork to help companies make informed decisions. It also helps many other stakeholders better understand CSRD’s impacts. To achieve this, we propose a deep learning framework based on long short-term memory (LSTM) for identifying and predicting CSRD patterns. Moreover, a correlation-based technique is also used to visualize the relationships between variables and identify the significant features. The dataset used in this study was collected from annual reports, CSR reports, and firms’ websites between 2015 and 2018. It contains a variety of variables to explain the CSR behaviour of 117 companies. The proposed framework is evaluated with several approaches, including logistic regression (LR), K-nearest neighbours (KNN), support vector machines (SVM), random forests (RF), and decision trees (DT). Compared to other machine learning models, experiment results show that LSTM achieved acceptable results with the highest accuracy of .
... These include bibliometric CSR studies in several areas, for example in corporate social performance (De Bakker et al., 2005), supply chain management (Feng et al., 2017), sustainability interrelations (Meseguer-Sánchez et al., 2021), management science (Lulewicz-Sas, 2017), corporate reputation (Li et al., 2020), and communication (Ji et al., 2020). At the same time, the investigation of CSR through topical modeling exercises has increased lately, such as CSR conversation (Chae & Park, 2018) and CSR reports (Goloshchapova et al., 2019;Lindgren et al., 2021). These numerous studies pave the research path for organizational practitioners and ethical scholars in responsible business model flexibility. ...
This study provides the first hybrid model by applying bibliometric analysis and topic modeling for mapping the intellectual structure of CSiR literature to improve business model flexibility. It has the following research objectives: (1) overview of CSiR literature for publications trends, influential studies, significant authors, dominant journals, and location of authors (literature evolution); (2) prevalent and emerging themes in CSiR (topic identification and labeling); (3) topics development in CSiR literature (topic development and trends); and (4) academia progress in CSiR research, and directions for future CSiR research. Drawing on documents selected from 1990 to mid-2021, we propose a hybrid model for our study: a mix of (1) bibliometric analysis through the VOSviewer program, wherein we use citation analysis, keywords co-occurrence analysis, co-citation analysis, and co-authorship analysis; and (2) topic modeling exercise through a machine learning approach. We also observe current and emerging topics by building a topic-word distribution matrix, analyze their development, and witness topic initiation across different periods. Further, we identify the details of academic progress in CSiR that impede the development of CSiR literature. Underdeveloped CSiR conceptualization and operationalization impede the growth of CSiR literature. We find that there is less collaboration among authors for CSiR research. Lastly, we conclude by presenting potential areas for future research.
... We opt to base our coding scheme on the materiality map provided by the SASB. The SASB focuses on financially material issues that often matter the most to investors, and past studies have shown that an investor approach to determining materiality is also predominantly applied in nonfinancial reporting (Lindgren et al., 2021), primarily stemming from the long tradition of such a focus in financial reporting (Brown and Dillard, 2015;Harrison and Smith, 2015;Mitchell et al., 2015;Zeff, 1978). Past studies have also shown that investors value such information (Khan et al., 2016). ...
In this paper, we investigate the direct and indirect effects of the EU-wide mandatory CSR reporting reform (2014/95/EU). We argue and find that, in addition to direct effects, coercive pressure also has spillover effects. An example of such a spillover effect of coercive pressure due to the reform is the change in reporting behavior of firms not subject to the reform, i.e., not directly coerced by the regulation. We exploit the Swedish implementation of the reform as a natural experiment to test our hypotheses and find that firms coerced by the reform increase their CSR reporting by 3.5 issues on average. However, firms not coerced by the regulation but close to being regulated increase their CSR reporting by 5.2 issues. As such, firms close to being regulated change their behavior more at the time of the reform than do those that are actually regulated. We also find that the spillover effects are significantly higher for low than high prereform reporters. On the other hand, the direct effects on low prereform reporters are insignificant. Together, the results refine our understanding of the institutionalization process of CSR reporting in a mandatory setting. The results are robust for various model specifications and provide useful insights for regulators and managers.
... Akomea-Frimpong et al. (2022) explain green finance by exposing the influences of green securities, green investments, climate finance, carbon finance, green insurance, green credit, and green infrastructural bonds [22]. Commonly, the reports aligning sustainability as corporate social responsibility influence stakeholders and shareholders [23]. In environments where a stakeholder approach to management is dominant, the firms still focus their sustainability reports on shareholders as the primary audience. ...
... Despite what people claim to know, what they practice is different. This gap suggests that education on sustainability and its relatedness is crucial in promoting sustainable behaviour, as claimed in previous research [9,10,23]. According to Leal Filho et al. (2019), implementing the SDGs at universities is still in its infancy [11]. ...
This study aims to advance the understanding of sustainable behaviour by exploring the perceptions, knowledge, and opinions about the sustainability of nearly graduated students in Portugal. A three-wave exploratory and longitudinal study was conducted with Management and Marketing students in 2020, 2021, and 2022. The findings come from both quantitative and qualitative approaches. First, the results reveal low levels of knowledge about sustainability, Sustainable Development Goals, and other related concepts. Then, by a qualitative analysis, this study highlights the terms related to sustainability and perceived sustainable practices. It also examines changes perceived since the COVID-19 pandemic and what their threats and opportunities in the coming years are. The main conclusion of this study is the critical need for education on sustainability and related concepts beyond simple recycling practices. The use of sustainability as a marketing tool is insufficient to create a viable future. Higher education must develop a new shared and sustainable vision for sustainability education.
